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In the news today: Zoning changes for Panoramic Hill and Telegraph, fines for daycare centers proposed, new marijuana regulations, 155-unit apartment complex for South Shattuck, credit card fraud and a music club in financial trouble.

Tuesday City Council meeting to include special session on 2011 budget

The Berkeley City Council meeting Tuesday will begin with a special 5:30 p.m. workshop on the proposed fiscal year 2011 city budget given by City Manager Phil Kamlarz and Budget Manager Tracey Vesley . It can be viewed online. The regular 7 p.m. Council meeting agenda includes Panoramic Hill zoning amendments as well as proposed adjustments to the Telegraph Avenue zoning laws.

Berkeley Mayor Tom Bates and Councilmembers Laurie Capitelli, Kriss Worthington and Gordon Wozniak will request the City Manager to analyze and work with relevant commissions on proposed modifications in Telegraph's current commercial zoning which would permit businesses to extend their business hours to 3 a.m., Sunday through Saturday by simply getting a zoning certificate.

Other adjustments include implementing a six month trial project to change the yellow loading zone parking regulations in the Telegraph commercial zone between Bancroft and Dwight Way to mirror the rest of the city's yellow zones, which revert to regular parking after 6 p.m.

The City Manager is expected to return to council by Oct. 12 with recommendations for council action.

Berkeley May Fine Large Home Family Daycares

The Berkeley City Council may also ask City Manager Phil Kamlarz Tuesday to review cases involving large, in-home family day care businesses whose owners have not obtained a Berkeley business license, not paid Berkeley business fees or don't have the appropriate use permit.

After the City Manager's office finished the review, it would develop a 90-day amnesty program during which large family daycare providers who have not yet obtained business licenses would be given a chance to come forward and register their businesses without being subject to penalties.

The city would also develop a payment plan for this group of daycare businesses, under which they would have to pay business fees due since 2007.

According to a report from city staff, some providers may have to pay fees of up to $7000 to the city. A number of daycare owners have contacted the city saying that these exorbitant payments might force them out of business altogether.

The staff report says that although the City Auditor has requested information from four large in-home family daycares, she has not yet received a response.

Medical Marijuana Regulation Changes

The Berkeley City Council will also vote on whether to allow all three of the city’s medical marijuana dispensaries to expand beyond retail space to grow cannabis and bake marijuana-laced cookies and brownies in residential and commercial properties. Both city staff and the Medical Cannabis Commission are putting forward their own set of recommendations which vary regarding the size and scope of the proposed operations.

The council will also vote on whether to approve language for a ballot measure for Nov. 2010 to amend the Business License Tax Ordinance to tax certain medical cannabis uses.

City Attorney Zach Cowan has suggested that one way to balance the city's current deficit is to increase the business tax on medical cannabis dispensaries from 1.12 percent to 1.8 percent, which is expected to bring in $330,000 in 2011.

In comparison, the city imposes a 15 percent tax on firearm and ammunition dealers, a 15 percent tax on private rubbish haulers and a 10 percent tax on private sporting events.

In the scenario that a medical cannabis dispensary attains non-profit status and becomes exempt from business tax, Cowan said it would be taxed on the basis of its square feet, just as large non-profits already are.

Berkeley Approves $60 M Parker Place Development

Developers Ali Kashani and Mark Rhoades of City Centric Investments have received the entitlements to their Parker Place project, the SF Business Times reported today.

Developers of the mixed-use apartment project with 155units, a 188-spot parking garage and 1900 square feet of retail space at 2600 Shattuck Ave. promise to revitalize an otherwise underutilized part of the neighborhood, but like a lot of other building projects, this one has met with some criticism.

Twenty percent of the rental units will be affordable housing which will help the developers get access to low income housing tax credits.

Berkeley Police Warn of Credit Card Fraud

The Berkeley Police Department is asking the community to watch out for credit card thefts which they say have escalated over the last few months.

Although the police did not point toward specific cases, they said the problem was probably part of a larger operation and urged caution.

Berkeley music venue in trouble

The SF Chronicle reports text that the all volunteer underground music venue 924 Gilman St. is in trouble because of a high rent increase starting July 1 which may push it out of its home.

The staff at 924 Gilman is reaching out to the community to raise the extra $31,000 required annually to cover the rent expenses, scheduling concerts, donation drives and there are plans to apply for non-profit status to qualify for special funds.

[Editor's Note: This was received as a press release at 3 on Monday afternoon. A more complete article will follow. Berkeley Police Department Public Information Officer Jamie Perkins confirmed that the crime at Rabbi Lerner's home in the 900 block of Cragmont was reported at 11:40 today, Monday, and she said at about 6 p.m. that there were no suspects as yet.]

Berkeley police today confirmed that the attack on Rabbi Lerner's home late Sunday May 2nd or early morning Monday May 3rd was in fact a crime and was being investigated.

The attackers used a powerful form of glue to attach posters to his door and around the property of his home attacking Lerner personally, and attacking liberals and progressives as being supporters of terrorism and "Islamo-fascism." They posted a printed bumper sticker saying "fight terror--support Israel" next to a carcature of Judge Goldstone whose UN report on Israel's human rights violations in its attack on Gaza last year has been denounced as anti-Semitic and pro-terror by right wingers in Israel and the U.S.. The caricature has Goldstone talking about his being kept from his grandson's bar mitzvah, and the caricature of Rabbi Lerner responds by saying "any enemy of Israel is a friend of mine." This attack and vandalism follows on a week filled with Lerner and Tikkun staff receiving hate mail, prompted apparently by Tikkun's announcement that in case the South African Zionists had succeeded in preventing Judge Goldstone from attending his grandson's bar mitzvah, as they threatened several weeks ago, that Rabbi Lerner would gladly hold the bar mitzvah in the SF Bay Area instead, and following Tikkun's announcement that in light of Goldstone's courageous willingness to stand up for human rights in Israel (his report called on the Israeli government to do its own independent, pulbic and credibly objective investigation, punish those responsible for the crimes or show that they didn't happen, and thereby show that these actions were not government policy but the mistakes or evil choices by people in the IDF who were acting as rogue elements and not as a manifestation of the people of Israel) that Tikkun will award our prestigious Tikkun Award to Judge Goldstone in 2011 at the event celebrating our 25th anniversary! This story, which was prominent in Ha'aretz and many other Jewish magazines and websites, has intensified anger against Lerner and Tikkun among those who seek to perpetuate the Occupation, and great support among those who realize that the Occupation is really hurtful both to Israel and to the Jewish people world-wide.

In the 24 years of Tikkun's operation, we have received many death threats and vicious hate mail, including phone calls to our office announcing that "Rabbi Lerner is dead" and others saying "We will kill all of you." This particular attack has two worrisome elements not previously there: 1. They attack Rabbi Lerner's home. As law enforcement people told us, this is a way of conveying the messaget to Lerner: "We know where you live, we know your house is vulnerable, so don't ignore our threats." 2. By linking Lerner to alleged terrorism, they provide for themselves and other extremists a "right-wing justification" to use violence against Lerner, even though Lerner has been a prominent advocate of non-violence. He regularly critiques Palestinian acts of violence when they occur, including the shelling of Israeli towns by Hamas, just as he critiques the violence of the Israeli occupation, and as he critiques the US war in Iraq and Afghanistan, the occupation of Chechny by Russia, the occupation of Tibet by China, the human rights violations agaisnt their own people by the rulers of Iran, the acts of violence of those resisting the US occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan, the violence against women and homosexuals in many Arab and African countries (and in the US and Israel as well), the genocide in Darfur, the violence against Jews in some parts of Europe, and the list goes on.

Needless to say, this latest attack, on Lerner's home, has caused great concern to his family.

In a previous email about the attack on Rabbi Lerner's house, the dates were incorrectly stated as June 2 and July 3rd, making it seem as though it had been in the distant past or near future. The emotional upset caused by this incident has thrown us for a loop, so sorry about that mistake. The actual date of the attack on Lerner's home was last night (May 2nd or early morning May 3rd) and discovered this morning, May 3rd.

The police say that this is not a "hate crime" because the attackers were not attacking Rabbi Lerner for his religion, but for his politics. That is scant comfort for those of us who continue to beleve that America and Israel are best served by the voices willing to publicly share critique, though incidents like this are of course meant to scare people into silence. Tikkun will not be silenced.

What can you do? Let people know that this kind of thing is happening in the Jewish world to people who critique Israeli policies.

Last night the Berkeley City Council unanimously approved the “Reduced Impact Alternative” BRT that is similar to “Rapid Bus Plus” as the “Locally Preferred Alternative.” It rejected the “Build Alternative” which would have removed traffic lanes and placed boarding stations in the middle of the street even though AC Transit sent a letter saying, more or less, that it was obliged to choose that alternative. This meeting with Bus Rapid Transit the only agenda item ended after 11:00 pm. Sixty-six members of the public were against the “Build Alternative,” twenty-three in favor and five asked all alternatives to be studied. Here are the alternatives.

Since the draft EIR/EIS only studied the No-Build and the Full-Build, there was discussion between the AC Transit representative, Cory LaVigne, and the city’s attorney about whether a different alternative could now be studied. LaVigne said since it was not in the draft, it could not be studied in the final. It would have to be a special study, perhaps a supplemental EIR. So after the deed is done, AC Transit comes to the cities to ask them for their preferred alternative. But as the attorney assured the city council, the city itself, not AC Transit, determines changes to their streets.

The council’s decision does not affect AC Transit’s ability to receive federal Small-Start funds because dedicated lanes are not one of the required criteria for BRT. But AC Transit’s fiscal condition may make them ineligible. See BRT Small Starts Fact Sheet.

Councilmembers discussed the “environmental justice” of removing local service because it would impact the elderly and disabled. But retaining local service did not seem to be included in the “Reduced Impact Alternative.” It was part of the “Rapid Bus Plus” alternative. Also included in that alternative was splitting the line in downtown Oakland to avoid the bunching that occurs on very long lines like the #51.

Some council members wanted to extend the BRT down University Ave. to Amtrak, which would mean it would connect to the San Pablo Rapid Bus, but AC Transit claimed it could not be studied now.

Mayor Bates asked how Berkeley would connect to Oakland if they have dedicated lanes. The short answer was “awkwardly.” But Temescal residents are not likely to accept dedicated lanes:See this week’s article in the East Bay Express.

Joyce Roy is a semi-retired architect and long-time Oakland transit activist. Partisan Position writers are not guaranteed to be impartial, although they are knowledgeable and hope to provide accurate factual information.

Money solves everything, or at least in the case of Wareham Development, it helped prevent what the company considered a big thorn from moving into prime retail space located in West Berkeley.

According to the Berkeley Voice Wareham recently bought the former Scharffen Berger Chocolate building at 914 Heinz St.--space the Berkeley Patients Group had earmarked for relocating their cannabis dispensary.

The Berkeley Patients Group faced opposition from both Wareham, who contended that a cannabis dispensary would bring down real estate value and alienate prospective buyers, and Ecole Bilingue, a French American school located next to the candy factory.

Ecole Bilingue argued that there was a loophole in city law which prohibited marijuana clinics from opening up 1,000 feet of public schools, but didn't mention anything about private schools.

Both Wareham and Ecole Bilingue had threatened to sue if Berkeley Patients Group went ahead with their plans.

More Pink Slips for BUSD Classified Employees

The Berkeley Unified School District is facing a tough time once again, and on Wednesday the Berkeley Board of Education approved pink slips for 30 classified employees.

The layoffs are expected to save about $900,000, a third of the district's projected shortfall, which has sent the district scrambling to find ways to stay afloat, including considering two furlough days in the new school year.

School districts across California are feeling the pain of the state's budget crisis, and many schools have already increased class sizes and some are even teaching their students in the dark to save on energy bills.

UC Berkeley Scientists Sequence Frog Genome

The UC Berkeley News Center reported Thursday that a team of scientists led by the Department of Energy's Joint Genome Institute (JGI) and the university will publish the first genome sequence of an amphibian, the African clawed frog Xenopus tropicalis.

The lead researchers hope that the discovery will fill a major gap among vertebrates sequenced until now, and can now go on to design gene chips to look at changes in gene expression across the whole genome.

Hip Hop in People's Park Saturday

Get ready for a free hip hop concert in People's Park Saturday, May 1, noon to 5 p.m., presented by the UC Berkeley Students for Hip Hop.

"Driving while Black." "Walking while Black." These are phrases in the contemporary vernacular for racial profiling, which is defined as the inclusion of racial or ethnic characteristics in determining whether a person is considered likely to commit a particular type of crime or an illegal act or to behave in a "predictable" manner. Arizona's new immigration law will now target those "walking or driving while Brown."

The Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution guarantees the right to be safe from unreasonable search and seizure without probable cause. Since the majority of people of all races are law-abiding citizens, merely being of a race, which a police officer believes to be more likely to commit a crime than another, is not probable cause. In addition, the Fourteenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution requires that all citizens be treated equally under the law. It follows then that it is unconstitutional for a representative of the government to make decisions based on race.

Interestingly, recent polls show that 71 percent of African-Americans, long-time victims of racial profiling, support the ethnic profiling of people who look to be of middle-eastern descent as do 66 percent of whites.

Many states, including California, specifically prohibit racial profiling of both motorists and pedestrians and prohibit profiling based on religion or religious appearance. Arizona has no such prohibitions.

It is not clear how the U.S. Supreme Court views racial profiling. Two recent cases suggest that the Supreme Court might disregard state and municipal efforts to circumscribe arbitrary police behavior motivated by racial profiling. In the 1996 case of Whren v. United States, Justice Antonin Scalia, writing for a unanimous court, found no impropriety, Constitutional or otherwise, when Washington, D.C. plain clothes officers in an unmarked car stopped two Black men for minor traffic violations in order to search their car for drugs. D.C. regulations specifically prohibit police officers from making traffic stops unless the driver was somehow threatening public safety. Remarkably, in upholding the validity of the pretext stop, Justice Scalia found the plain clothes officers had met the reasonable suspicion standard.

In the 2008 case of Virginia v. Moore, Justice Scalia again writing for a unanimous court, saw no violation of Moore's Fourth Amendment rights against unreasonable search and seizure. The police officers in this case received a call that a man known as "Chubs" was driving without a license. What was not mentioned in the Court's opinion was that the "Chubs" mentioned in the radio transmission was not Moore, but a man named Christopher Delbridge. This was noted by the Virginia Supreme Court in reversing the lower court decision. The police did not search Moore at the scene. Rather, they took him to his hotel room where they searched him and found crack cocaine. Moore is African-American living in Portsmouth, Virginia, where more than 50 percent of the population is Black. The Supreme Court refused to address the issue of racial profiling.

Finally, a third case has raised concern among civil rights advocates. In the 2008 case of Cerqueira v. American Airlines, Inc., the Supreme Court declined, without explanation, to hear the case of a man who was kicked off an American Airlines jetliner in Boston because a flight attendant thought he looked like a Middle Eastern terrorist. John Cerqueira is an American citizen of Portuguese heritage who was trying to fly home to Fort Lauderdale. Instead, he was escorted off the jetliner and questioned by police for two hours because American Airlines personnel thought his dark hair and olive complexion made him look Middle Eastern. Cerqueira sued American Airlines for discrimination and won. A federal court of appeals court reversed the lower court decision. It seems that airline safety trumped Cerqueira's individual rights. Cerqueira is not alone in his plight. From 2001 to 2008, the Department of Transportation had received 953 complaints of discrimination against U.S. airlines.

As an aside, Section 412 of the Patriot Act permits the U.S. attorney general to detain aliens he certifies as threats to national security for up to seven days without bringing charges. The standard for detention is the familiar reasonable suspicion standard enunciated by the Supreme Court in Terry

What about Arizona's immigration law? The law makes it a state crime to be in the state illegally. The law also requires immigrants to carry their alien registration documents at all times and requires police to question people if there is reason to suspect they're in the U.S. illegally. It also targets those who hire illegal immigrant day laborers or knowingly transport them.

The law will probably be challenged on two legal theories: (1) that Arizona cannot enact its own scheme to regulate immigration; and (2) the law essentially codifies racial profiling. Article 1, Section 8 of the U.S. Constitution gives Congress the power "to establish an uniform rule of naturalization." And in the 1976 case of Hampton v. Mow Sun Wong, the Supreme Court ruled that the Congressional power to regulate naturalization includes the power to regulate immigration because it does not make sense to allow Congress to pass laws on how an immigrant becomes a citizen if Congress cannot determine how that immigrant can come into this country in the first place. Therefore, the argument goes, only the U.S. has plenary authority over immigration because it is a national policy that affects relations with other nations such as Mexico, whose government has denounced the Arizona law.

The Arizona law gives law enforcement authorities carte blanche to make enforcement decisions based on race and ethnicity or racial profiling. The law will likely be challenged on that basis as well.

There is precedent for striking down the Arizona law. For example, a federal district court struck down California's Proposition 187, a 1994 initiative that sought to deny health and welfare benefits and public schooling to the undocumented. Federal district courts in Pennsylvania and Texas have issued similar rulings overturning local ordinances that prohibited undocumented immigrants from renting homes or apartments. However, none of these cases has been affirmed by a federal court of appeals and thus, have not reached the U.S. Supreme Court.

Unlike these other cases, Arizona targets illegal immigrants themselves, not just their benefits and it imposes criminal penalties for conduct - being in the state illegally - that is not a federal crime but is only grounds for deportation. Arguably Arizona is regulating immigration, an exclusive right of the federal government and therefore, is unconstitutional.

Arizona has about 1.7 million residents of Hispanic or Latino origin, or about 30 percent of the population. This means that potentially 1.7 million Arizonans are likely targets for walking or driving while Brown.

A state appeals court in San Francisco on Monday upheld a lower court decision that the environmental report for Chevron's Richmond refinery expansion project is inadequate under state environmental laws.

Last June, a Contra Costa County Superior Court judge ruled that the refinery's environmental impact report on the project was invalid because it failed to disclose whether the project would enable the refinery to process heavier crude oil.

The ruling was followed by an injunction ordering the refinery to stop construction on the project, and Chevron began laying off workers.

Chevron appealed the superior court ruling to the state Court of Appeal, but the appellate court upheld the lower court's decision Monday.

"Chevron is disappointed with the Court of Appeal's ruling," Chevron spokesman Brent Tippen said today. "We feel both the evidence and the law amply supported the adequacy of the EIR prepared by the city of Richmond for the renewal project."

The Richmond City Council narrowly approved the company's Energy and Hydrogen Renewal Project in 2008 and the company broke ground in 2009.

Soon after the project was approved, however, a group of community groups represented by the nonprofit law firm Earthjustice sued the city, claiming the environmental impact report did not adhere to rules of the California Environmental Quality Act.

Refinery officials claimed the project was an upgrade that would increase the refinery's flexibility to process a wider variety of crude oil and improve the plant's energy efficiency and reliability. They also said the project would reduce overall emissions at the plant and that the environmental review was sufficient.

The environmental groups Communities for a Better Environment, the West County Toxics Coalition and Asian Pacific Environmental Network, however, claimed that the upgrade was actually an expansion that would enable the refinery to process heavier crude oil, resulting in increased pollution in nearby communities and a higher risk of an explosion at the plant.

Tippen said today that the company believes that the project was properly analyzed and permitted.

"We are now reviewing the court's decision and will determine what is next to be done," Tippen said.

Earthjustice attorney Will Rostov said, "The court agrees that the people of Richmond have a right to know just how dirty the crude oil processed in this refinery will be."

"The court pointed out the legal deficiencies in Chevron's refinery expansion plan and tells Chevron the simple steps it needs to expand their refinery in a legal way that won't harm neighbors," he said.

"Asthma rates in Richmond are already twice the national average, said Richmond resident Kay Wallis, a health educator with the Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine at University of California, San Francisco. "For decades, Richmond families have paid a steep price for living near Chevron's refinery."

In addition to describing the grade of crude oil the project will allow the refinery to process, the court is also requiring Chevron to revise its environmental report to include specific and proven mitigation efforts it will take for any increase in greenhouse gas emissions before it can proceed with the project.

The UC Berkeley student senate Wednesday failed to override the veto on a bill urging the university to divest from two American companies profiting by making weapons for the Israeli Army.

Senators debated the issue until the early hours of Thursday morning, and at about 4 a.m. the student senate voted 13 to 5 to bypass the veto, one vote short of the required margin.

Arizona Deportation Bill Protest at UC Berkeley

Student organizers at UC Berkeley announced a mass deportation protest at Sproul Plaza on the Berkeley campus Thursday against the recent passage of SB 1070 in Arizona. The bill aims to identify, prosecute and deport illegal immigrants and is being called one of the toughest—if not the toughest—illegal immigration bills in the country.

A press release sent out by the rally's organizers, including Spanish-language students on campus, described the bill as “promoting racial profiling in Arizona, and creating a state of terror against immigrants and non-immigrants alike.”

“[The bill] has made it necessary for campus community groups to act,” the press release says. The mass deportation action [will show our opposition to unjust and racist laws everywhere in this nation.”

Over 500 students were expected to participate in what the press release described as “a dramatic representation” of an I.C.E. raid.

“The main objective of this action is to illustrate the moral implications that this bill will generate not only in Arizona, but all over the United States,” a statement from the organizers said. “Although this law is targeted to the undocumented community, this issue affects everyone. It is an attack on our civil liberties, and a giant step backwards from a progressive society. SB 1070 is a seed for hate and predjudice, it dehumanizes communities and terrorizes families in Arizona and across the nation.”

AC Transit Board Considers Declaring Fiscal Emergency

AC Transit announced Wednesday that it might be facing a possible “state of emergency.” which could force its board of directors to declare fiscal crisis.

Burdened with increasing costs and dwindling financial resources, the board at its Wednesday meeting called for a public hearing May 26, 2010 to discuss the possibility of a “fiscal emergency,” which would allow the district to make ongoing adjustments in service and operations to counter a massive financial crunch.

AC Transit has recently seen a steady decline in traditional sources of funding, along with local sales and property taxes due to a weak local economy, according to a statement from the transit agency.

The district is estimated to have an operating deficit of more than $56 million by the end of the fiscal year 2011.

If the board declares a fiscal emergency, then it will be the second consecutive year the district has been forced to do so.

Berkeley Reports a Drop in Youth Tobacco Sales

The City of Berkeley reported Thursday that there has been a big drop in tobacco sales to young people in the city.

Youth Spirit Works Artwork Relaunches South Berkeley Business District

This Saturday, Youth Spirit Works Artwork will unveil “Visions of the Soul,” an art window banner exhibit for vacant storefronts to mark the launch of the Adeline Street Merchants Association, comprised of South Berkeley businesses and non-profit organizations.

The event will take place May 1, noon to 1:30 p.m. at 3308 Adeline St.

The UC Berkeley student senate Wednesday failed to override the veto on a bill urging the university to divest from two American companies profiting by making weapons for the Israeli Army.

Senators debated the issue until the early hours of Thursday morning, and at about 4 a.m. the student senate voted 13 to 5 to bypass the veto, one vote short of the required margin.

in the city.

Cabbie Arrested for Sex Assaults

An Oakland cab driver was arrested by the Berkeley Police Department Tuesday for sexually assaulting women passengers in his car in January 2008 and April 2010.

According to his victims, 29-year-old Ali Al Obadi of Oakland asked them to sit with him in the front seat, following which he proceeded to forcibly hold their hands and grope their breasts.

City Council Turns Down Appeal on Mitch Kapor's Home

The Berkeley City Council turned down an appeal on software mogul Mitch Kapor's house on Rose Street at Tuesday's City Council meeting, upholding the Zoning Adjustments Board's unanimous approval of the project.

The 10,000 square foot house with a 10-car garage project made the Home & Garden section of the New York Times last month, with its opponents arguing that the proposed building was too big to be called green.

The proposed project will demolish an existing two-story 2,477-square-foot residence with three detached garages.

The Kapors told the zoning board that they had decided to move from San Francisco to Berkeley to be near the UC Berkeley campus, where Mitch Kapor is an adjunct professor at the School of Information and his wife runs the IDEAL Scholars Fund serving minority students.

The Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive picked three architecture firms from a list of 10 to design the new museum and film archive at the site of the former UC printing plant at 2120 Oxford St.

The three firms chosen are Ann Beha Architects of Boston, Diller Scofidio + Renfro of New York and Tod Williams Billie Tsien Architects of New York, the architectural firm for UC Berkeley’s C.V. Starr East Asian Library.

BAM/PFA's Board of Trustees is expected to chose the finalist from among the three in June.

The museum is scheduled for opening in 2014.

UC Task Force Debates Sports Funding

The $13.7 million cost of UC Berkeley athletics was hotly discussed at a campus forum.

In a late night vote on Thursday, the Berkeley City Council voted to support hybrid alternatives to AC Transit's Bus Rapid Transit proposal which eliminate dedicated bus lanes and bus boarding stations in the center of the street. According to AC Transit spokesperson Cory LaVigne this plan can’t be considered as part of the environmental impact study currently underway, making it effectively a "no build" alternative at this point.

But AC transit staff who attended the meeting told councilmembers that the alternative proposals, including the Reduced Impact Alternative advanced by Mayor Bates and Councilmembers Capitelli and Maio and the "Rapid Bus Plus" scheme hatched by a coalition of Berkeleyans including Michael Katz, Craig Becker and Vincent Casalaina, could not be included in the final environmental impact study since they had not been part of the draft study. The AC planners said that a parallel study of these alternatives could be done.

Councilmember Darryl Moore made a substitute motion to endorse studying the "full build", but it was rejected by a 4-2-2 vote.

Comments from many members of the public and by the council extended the meeting past 11 p.m.

Many of the speakers in favor of the full build alternative were students who wanted faster trips, while many opponents mentioned impacts on businesses and street vendors on Telegraph as well as hardships to senior and disabled users if local stops were eliminated as AC Transit's plan proposed.

The usual catch-phrase for environmental responsibility is "Reduce, Reuse, Recycle." However, on Earth Day, in a small computer lab in University Village, Albany, a local group added "Repair" to the list. Toolbox open, my daughter grinned as she unscrewed the base of our long-broken vacuum cleaner. In a corner, two of my friends leaned over the disassembled guts of a malfunctioning laptop. Broken cameras, microwaves, and electronics filled the tables near their hopeful owners as tools were passed around and volunteers guided each project and offered advice.

The Fixit Clinic, a bi-monthly event organized and run by technologist Peter Mui, was founded in 2009 to help families gain the skills and confidence to fix things. Here, Peter won't just solve things for you. Instead, he shows participants how to evaluate problems, gather information online, and work logically to identify possible solutions. Any broken item small enough to carry is allowed, and parents are encouraged to bring their children. When I was young, I would sit with my father in our basement shop and help him fix things - toasters, clocks, whatever was broken. When it was obvious that our old phone was beyond repair, he let us kids take it apart. You really can't buy a better toy -- in the end we had it all in pieces, each of us claiming ownership of a different part. I still remember how the rubber button pad felt on my fingers, and how we hot-glued the circuit board to a #2 pencil to make an "electric pencil" gag gift.

Things are different now; it often just seems easier to throw old things away rather than figure out what is wrong with them or try to understand how they work. However, at the Earth Day Fixit Clinic, the final tally of landfill-rescued items included: a vacuum, two cameras, two microwaves, a CD player, a pair of headphones, and a hair dryer. With luck, those who attended will be more likely to try to fix things in their own at home the next time something breaks. And if the grins I saw at the clinic were any indication, they'll have fun doing it too.

Tuesday City Council meeting to include special session on 2011 budget

The Berkeley City Council meeting Tuesday will begin with a special 5:30 p.m. workshop on the proposed fiscal year 2011 city budget given by City Manager Phil Kamlarz and Budget Manager Tracey Vesley . It can be viewed online. The regular 7 p.m. Council meeting agenda includes Panoramic Hill zoning amendments as well as proposed adjustments to the Telegraph Avenue zoning laws.

Berkeley Mayor Tom Bates and Councilmembers Laurie Capitelli, Kriss Worthington and Gordon Wozniak will request the City Manager to analyze and work with relevant commissions on proposed modifications in Telegraph's current commercial zoning which would permit businesses to extend their business hours to 3 a.m., Sunday through Saturday by simply getting a zoning certificate.

Other adjustments include implementing a six month trial project to change the yellow loading zone parking regulations in the Telegraph commercial zone between Bancroft and Dwight Way to mirror the rest of the city's yellow zones, which revert to regular parking after 6 p.m.

The City Manager is expected to return to council by Oct. 12 with recommendations for council action.

Berkeley May Fine Large Home Family Daycares

The Berkeley City Council may also ask City Manager Phil Kamlarz Tuesday to review cases involving large, in-home family day care businesses whose owners have not obtained a Berkeley business license, not paid Berkeley business fees or don't have the appropriate use permit.

After the City Manager's office finished the review, it would develop a 90-day amnesty program during which large family daycare providers who have not yet obtained business licenses would be given a chance to come forward and register their businesses without being subject to penalties.

The city would also develop a payment plan for this group of daycare businesses, under which they would have to pay business fees due since 2007.

According to a report from city staff, some providers may have to pay fees of up to $7000 to the city. A number of daycare owners have contacted the city saying that these exorbitant payments might force them out of business altogether.

The staff report says that although the City Auditor has requested information from four large in-home family daycares, she has not yet received a response.

Medical Marijuana Regulation Changes

The Berkeley City Council will also vote on whether to allow all three of the city’s medical marijuana dispensaries to expand beyond retail space to grow cannabis and bake marijuana-laced cookies and brownies in residential and commercial properties. Both city staff and the Medical Cannabis Commission are putting forward their own set of recommendations which vary regarding the size and scope of the proposed operations.

The council will also vote on whether to approve language for a ballot measure for Nov. 2010 to amend the Business License Tax Ordinance to tax certain medical cannabis uses.

City Attorney Zach Cowan has suggested that one way to balance the city's current deficit is to increase the business tax on medical cannabis dispensaries from 1.12 percent to 1.8 percent, which is expected to bring in $330,000 in 2011.

In comparison, the city imposes a 15 percent tax on firearm and ammunition dealers, a 15 percent tax on private rubbish haulers and a 10 percent tax on private sporting events.

In the scenario that a medical cannabis dispensary attains non-profit status and becomes exempt from business tax, Cowan said it would be taxed on the basis of its square feet, just as large non-profits already are.

Berkeley Approves $60 M Parker Place Development

Developers Ali Kashani and Mark Rhoades of City Centric Investments have received the entitlements to their Parker Place project, the SF Business Times reported today.

Developers of the mixed-use apartment project with 155units, a 188-spot parking garage and 1900 square feet of retail space at 2600 Shattuck Ave. promise to revitalize an otherwise underutilized part of the neighborhood, but like a lot of other building projects, this one has met with some criticism.

Twenty percent of the rental units will be affordable housing which will help the developers get access to low income housing tax credits.

Berkeley Police Warn of Credit Card Fraud

The Berkeley Police Department is asking the community to watch out for credit card thefts which they say have escalated over the last few months.

Although the police did not point toward specific cases, they said the problem was probably part of a larger operation and urged caution.

Berkeley music venue in trouble

The SF Chronicle reports text that the all volunteer underground music venue 924 Gilman St. is in trouble because of a high rent increase starting July 1 which may push it out of its home.

The staff at 924 Gilman is reaching out to the community to raise the extra $31,000 required annually to cover the rent expenses, scheduling concerts, donation drives and there are plans to apply for non-profit status to qualify for special funds.

The UC Berkeley student senate Wednesday failed to override the veto on a bill urging the university to divest from two American companies profiting by making weapons for the Israeli Army.

Senators debated the issue until the early hours of Thursday morning, and at about 4 a.m. the student senate voted 13 to 5 to bypass the veto, one vote short of the required margin.

Arizona Deportation Bill Protest at UC Berkeley

Student organizers at UC Berkeley are expected to hold a mass deportation protest at Sproul Plaza on the Berkeley campus Thursday against the recent passage of SB 1070 in Arizona. The bill aims to identify, prosecute and deport illegal immigrants and is being called one of the toughest—if not the toughest—illegal immigration bills in the country.

A press release sent out by the rally's organizers, including Spanish-language students on campus, described the bill as “promoting racial profiling in Arizona, and creating a state of terror against immigrants and non-immigrants alike.”

“[The bill] has made it necessary for campus community groups to act,” the press release says. The mass deportation action [will show our opposition to unjust and racist laws everywhere in this nation.”

Over 500 students are expected to participate in what the press release described as “a dramatic representation” of an I.C.E. raid.

“The main objective of this action is to illustrate the moral implications that this bill will generate not only in Arizona, but all over the United States,” a statement from the organizers said. “Although this law is targeted to the undocumented community, this issue affects everyone. It is an attack on our civil liberties, and a giant step backwards from a progressive society. SB 1070 is a seed for hate and predjudice, it dehumanizes communities and terrorizes families in Arizona and across the nation.”

AC Transit Board Considers Declaring Fiscal Emergency

AC Transit announced Wednesday that it might be facing a possible “state of emergency.” which could force its board of directors to declare fiscal crisis.

Burdened with increasing costs and dwindling financial resources, the board at its Wednesday meeting called for a public hearing May 26, 2010 to discuss the possibility of a “fiscal emergency,” which would allow the district to make ongoing adjustments in service and operations to counter a massive financial crunch.

AC Transit has recently seen a steady decline in traditional sources of funding, along with local sales and property taxes due to a weak local economy, according to a statement from the transit agency.

The district is estimated to have an operating deficit of more than $56 million by the end of the fiscal year 2011.

If the board declares a fiscal emergency, then it will be the second consecutive year the district has been forced to do so.

Ozzie's Soda Fountain is Now in Elmwood Café

The San Francisco Chronicle reports that Ozzie's Soda Fountain, which closed down in 2007, reopened in March in a new restaurant called the Elmwood Cafe

Berkeley Reports a Drop in Youth Tobacco Sales

The City of Berkeley reported Thursday that there has been a big drop in tobacco sales to young people in the city.

Youth Spirit Works Artwork Relaunches South Berkeley Business District

This Saturday, Youth Spirit Works Artwork will unveil “Visions of the Soul,” an art window banner exhibit for vacant storefronts to mark the launch of the Adeline Street Merchants Association, comprised of South Berkeley businesses and non-profit organizations.

The event will take place May 1, noon to 1:30 p.m. at 3308 Adeline St.

A roundup of important events in Berkeley, as reported in other media:

Divestment Back on the Table at UC Berkeley

All eyes were on the UC Berkeley student senate Wednesday as they made a final attempt to pass a bill calling for divestment of university funds from companies profiting by selling weapons to the Israeli Army.

The senate meeting was scheduled to begin at 8 p.m. in the Pauley Ballroom in the MLK Student Union Building on the Berkeley campus, but was postponed until 10:30 because of a conflict with another group which had been scheduled to use the room from 6 to 9. UC police at the building said they had insisted that a large enough room be scheduled for the large crowd which was expected.

According to some ASUC senators, there may be some alternative language proposed at the meeting, and a final vote taken.

The campus student group Students for Justice in Palestine (calsjp.org) sent out a press release Wednesday saying that if the bill passes, “UC Berkeley will be the most prominent U.S. university to call for divestment, after Hampshire College, the University of Michigan Dearborn and the University of Wisconsin.”

UC San Diego is expected to vote on a similar divestment bill.

Cabbie Arrested for Sex Assaults

An Oakland cab driver was arrested by the Berkeley Police Department Tuesday for sexually assaulting women passengers in his car in January 2008 and April 2010.

According to his victims, 29-year-old Ali Al Obadi of Oakland asked them to sit with him in the front seat, following which he proceeded to forcibly hold their hands and grope their breasts.

City Council Turns Down Appeal on Mitch Kapor's Home

The Berkeley City Council turned down an appeal on software mogul Mitch Kapor's house on Rose Street at Tuesday's City Council meeting, upholding the Zoning Adjustments Board's unanimous approval of the project.

The 10,000 square foot house with a 10-car garage project made the Home & Garden section of the New York Times last month, with its opponents arguing that the proposed building was too big to be called green.

The proposed project will demolish an existing two-story 2,477-square-foot residence with three detached garages.

The Kapors told the zoning board that they had decided to move from San Francisco to Berkeley to be near the UC Berkeley campus, where Mitch Kapor is an adjunct professor at the School of Information and his wife runs the IDEAL Scholars Fund serving minority students.

After listening to several hours of public testimony at its April 20 meeting meeting , the Berkeley City Council Thursday (April 29) will vote on whether to forward a build alternative to AC Transit for study in its environmental impact review.

The meeting is scheduled for 7 p.m. at Longfellow Middle School, 1500 Derby St. at Sacramento, Berkeley. The most contentious issues on the table include a two-way Telegraph Avenue and dedicated bus lanes downtown.

The Oakland City Council gave its support for BRT at its April 20 City Council meeting.

Three Firms to Submit Proposals for New BAM/PFA Design

The Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive picked three architecture firms from a list of 10 to design the new museum and film archive at the site of the former UC printing plant at 2120 Oxford St.

The three firms chosen are Ann Beha Architects of Boston, Diller Scofidio + Renfro of New York and Tod Williams Billie Tsien Architects of New York, the architectural firm for UC Berkeley’s C.V. Starr East Asian Library.

BAM/PFA's Board of Trustees is expected to chose the finalist from among the three in June.

The museum is scheduled for opening in 2014.

WSJ Talks to UCB Expert on the Gizmodo Case

The Wall Street Journal interviewed the executive director of the Berkeley Center for Criminal Justice at UC Berkeley law school about the legal implications of the Gizmodo raid.

UC Task Force Debates Sports Funding

The $13.7 million cost of UC Berkeley athletics was hotly discussed at a campus forum.

A state appeals court in San Francisco on Monday upheld a lower court decision that the environmental report for Chevron's Richmond refinery expansion project is inadequate under state environmental laws.

Last June, a Contra Costa County Superior Court judge ruled that the refinery's environmental impact report on the project was invalid because it failed to disclose whether the project would enable the refinery to process heavier crude oil.

The ruling was followed by an injunction ordering the refinery to stop construction on the project, and Chevron began laying off workers.

Chevron appealed the superior court ruling to the state Court of Appeal, but the appellate court upheld the lower court's decision Monday.

"Chevron is disappointed with the Court of Appeal's ruling," Chevron spokesman Brent Tippen said today. "We feel both the evidence and the law amply supported the adequacy of the EIR prepared by the city of Richmond for the renewal project."

The Richmond City Council narrowly approved the company's Energy and Hydrogen Renewal Project in 2008 and the company broke ground in 2009.

Soon after the project was approved, however, a group of community groups represented by the nonprofit law firm Earthjustice sued the city, claiming the environmental impact report did not adhere to rules of the California Environmental Quality Act.

Refinery officials claimed the project was an upgrade that would increase the refinery's flexibility to process a wider variety of crude oil and improve the plant's energy efficiency and reliability. They also said the project would reduce overall emissions at the plant and that the environmental review was sufficient.

The environmental groups Communities for a Better Environment, the West County Toxics Coalition and Asian Pacific Environmental Network, however, claimed that the upgrade was actually an expansion that would enable the refinery to process heavier crude oil, resulting in increased pollution in nearby communities and a higher risk of an explosion at the plant.

Tippen said today that the company believes that the project was properly analyzed and permitted.

"We are now reviewing the court's decision and will determine what is next to be done," Tippen said.

Earthjustice attorney Will Rostov said, "The court agrees that the people of Richmond have a right to know just how dirty the crude oil processed in this refinery will be."

"The court pointed out the legal deficiencies in Chevron's refinery expansion plan and tells Chevron the simple steps it needs to expand their refinery in a legal way that won't harm neighbors," he said.

"Asthma rates in Richmond are already twice the national average, said Richmond resident Kay Wallis, a health educator with the Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine at University of California, San Francisco. "For decades, Richmond families have paid a steep price for living near Chevron's refinery."

In addition to describing the grade of crude oil the project will allow the refinery to process, the court is also requiring Chevron to revise its environmental report to include specific and proven mitigation efforts it will take for any increase in greenhouse gas emissions before it can proceed with the project.

AC Transit riders should brace for another round of cuts after major service changes and reductions went into effect March 28 to cope with a projected $56 million deficit in the 2010-2011 fiscal year.

The agency's Board of Directors is expected to decide at an April 28 meeting whether to set a public hearing on May 26 for the proposed reductions being planned for August 2010.

According to an AC transit memo, the agency is expected to save nearly $11.5 million from the additional reductions, which will require reduction of an estimated 182,000 annual platform hours of service.

In Sept. 2009, the board received testimony about a 15 percent service reduction required as part of an attempt to balance the then-estimated $57 million shortfall. The board subsequently diverted $35 million from the Bus Rapid Transit project to AC Transit's operating budget on Oct. 28, 2009 to minimize service impacts and essentially reduced the service reductions originally proposed by half.

The March service cuts are expected to bring forth annual saving of $10.34 million, but according to the AC transit memo, the “financial situation has not yet rebounded.”

A recent report released by AC Transit staff shows that the agency is faced with a $56 million deficit through June 2011.

Thus, an additional $11.44 million in service reductions is necessary to keep AC Transit afloat, which will reduce its current 1.93 million platform hours to 1,744,000.

According to the memo, preservation of core services will be given a priority, which could result in more severe reduction of weekend services in order to save weekday service.

Some of the scenarios being considered include:

• Operation of trunk and major corridor services only on weekends – This alternative would severely reduce the number of weekend routes operated by the district, in order to preserve the weekday service platform hours as much as possible.

• Comparison of all-nighter service strategies – This scenario involves a comparison of two alternatives:

a. Elimination of Lines 802, 805, 840 and 851 – Lines 800 and 801 provide basic BART “spine” coverage, and the district is subsidized for their operations. This alternative would result in a loss of service to the San Pablo Avenue corridor, MacArthur Boulevard/73rd Avenue/Oakland Airport corridor, Foothill Boulevard corridor, and the College Avenue/Broadway/Santa Clara Avenue corridor.

b. Retention of all-nighter lines and reduction of trunk-level service after 10 p.m. – Trends indicate that ridership along the trunk corridors drops significantly after 10 p.m., and may not require the trunk-level frequency currently in place. Staff has reviewed ridership for all trunk lines and proposed several changes that will ultimately lead to a more efficient use of available resources.

• A proportionate service reduction across the district – This scenario would involve a 8 percent service reduction to both weekday and weekend service platforms throughout the district.

If approved, the changes are expected to go into effect by August 22, 2010.

On April 20 the Oakland City Council did indeed vote to support the full-build “Locally Preferred Alternative,” i.e., the alternative preferred by AC Transit. But it also directed that “Rapid Bus Plus” be studied as an alternative. The Public Works Committee had decided they wanted to “Study East Bay Bus Rapid Transit Project without the use of a dedicated traffic lane” and which would “Provide Level Boarding.” “Rapid Bus Plus,” unlike the no-build and the full-build alternatives, would split the line at downtown Oakland so you won’t get bunching like on the #51 line, and it, also, retains local service. So there is a lot to say for the “Rapid Bus Plus” but, unfortunately, you can’t get level boarding without bulb-outs (which would make it “Curbside BRT” or “Rapid Bus Plus Plus.”) The entry of the present Van Hool low-aisle buses is 14.56” above the street. (And the standard for American low-floor buses are “no more than 15 ½”.) Sidewalk curbs are about 6” so without bulb-outs one would have to do something really weird, and probably hazardous to pedestrians, in order to provide level boarding from sidewalks.

For and against speakers at the Council meeting were about equal but the public comments in the Staff Report were 17 pro, 63 con and 20 commented on other issues. The approval was quite smooth because there is little public awareness of the issues. Unlike Berkeley, which has held public meetings for years, Oakland only had one month, in January, of public meetings and only one meeting in each neighborhood! If there is not the outcry in Oakland that there is in Berkeley, it may simply be that there is little public knowledge.

AC Transit’s preferred alternative is the full-build one because it gives preference to buses and short shift to other vehicles and pedestrians and the quality of public spaces. The Downtown Berkeley Association (DBA) Design Committee best spelled this out in comments, June 26, 2007, which is applicable to more than downtown Berkeley:

“We believe that the required BRT infrastructure alternatives, as proposed in the draft DEIS/DEIR, are an imposition of transit engineering systems on Downtown Berkeley’s densely built environment, rather than a careful integration into and enhancement of that environment, with significant negative impacts that are not adequately mitigated. The alternatives and mitigations offered do not adequately demonstrate how the new infrastructure will improve the overall urban design or the pedestrian, retail, and cultural environment. Additional transit patrons, separate transit lanes, crosswalk mitigations, and new stations do not necessarily lead to overall improvements in the urban environment.”

To call this a “Complete Streets” proposal is akin to developers using the buzz word “Smart Growth” label for green-field developments.

The DBA recommended that a “Side Running” alternative (a.k.a. Curbside BRT) be studied but AC Transit refused. So it is AC Transit that is the decider not the local cities.

But then “no-build” may become the alternative. There may not be the expected Federal Small-Starts funding available because one requirement is that “ The agency is in reasonably good financial condition.” The agency plans to cut back service by another 7.5% in August and may put another parcel tax on the ballot.

Too bad, because if AC Transit gave up dedicated lanes and middle-of-the-road platforms (neither of which are required for Small-Starts funding) there could be enough funding for “Curbside BRT”, or “Side-Running BRT” or “Rapid Bus Plus Plus” (or whatever you want to call it) on Telegraph St, International Blvd AND MacArthur and Foothill, both of which have high ridership. Info on Small-Starts can be found

Joyce Roy is a transit activist and semi-retired architect. Partisan Position articles are those written by advocates or activists in the subject matter area.

Editor's Note: The video of the Oakland City Council's vote can be seen here.

The motion is by Nancy Nadel, starting at 3:39:25. It's evidently a recommendation to study both full-build and Rapid Bus Plus, on a fairly equal basis and to study some additional impacts and mitigations.

The Albany community came together for open space and recreation for the Albany Waterfront, allowing only minimal ‘green’ development in its vision for the waterfront.

On April 19, 2010, the Albany City Council unanimously voted to accept the results of its study, the Voices to Vision Report, to be used as a living document that reflects Albany citizens' visions on waterfront planning. Mayor Joanne Wile described Voices to Vision as admirable. She joined the council in praising the participants as well as Fern Tiger & Associates for their hard work and dedication to producing an open, inclusive, comprehensive process and result.

Albany began this intensive two-year process to get the community's vision for the Albany waterfront at the urging of environmentalists, including Citizens for East Shore Parks (CESP), the Sierra Club, and Golden Gate Audubon, and Citizens for the Albany Shoreline (CAS).

Dubbed “Voices to Vision,” the process involved public workshops, interviews and questionnaires, where everyone in Albany, plus outsiders, got the chance to participate and describe/create the waterfront they imagined.

The workshops were the high point - two massive sets of sessions with hands-on tabletop workshops designed to let participants “create” the waterfront to their liking. Participants started with a model of a plain Albany waterfront and then added park, open space, housing, retail, hotel, commercial, housing, racetrack, whatever their imaginations conjured, to form their own versions of the future Albany waterfront (with an eye to replace revenue that would be lost if the racetrack were to close).

The Long Awaited Results:

The vast majority of Albany residents want roughly 75% of the property to be preserved for open space and parks and want development to be limited to no more than 25% of the property.

According to Fern Tiger of Fern Tiger Associates, hired by Albany to create and conduct the process, Albany residents overwhelmingly wanted to preserve as much open space as they could, while still maintaining the revenue that the city and school district now see from the operations of the racetrack.

Despite a range of opinions, from ‘all park’ to ‘intense development’, the large majority of Albany residents wanted to preserve the income with limited development while devoting the balance to open space and park. Community members found they have more in common about the waterfront than differences.

Environmentalists support:

Environmentalists uniformly supported the Vision and urged the city council to vote to use the report as a guide by which to view any future development plan.

CESP President Robert Cheasty, in supporting the Voices to Vision, said that any potential development plans need to take into account that the Albany Waterfront sits in the middle of the Eastshore State Park and should not obstruct flow from the park. He also urged preserving Fleming Point and recognition of the historical significance of the last remaining part of the original shoreline in the East Bay.

Norman LaForce, Chair of the San Francisco Chapter of the Sierra Club, complimented the city for its foresight in creating this process, enabling Albany to have a vision to guide potential developers in understanding what the community would support.

For Data Junkies:

(From the survey) - In addition to open space, 97% of residents in the online survey agree that ‘enjoying nature’ and expanding or completing the Bay Trail (91%) are appropriate uses for the waterfront. Other highly rated uses for the shoreline include ‘waterfront recreation’ (86%), ‘exercise and sports’(74%), ‘bike/pedestrian bridge/zones from Buchanan’ (70/69%). However, more than two-thirds (68%) of those surveyed do not think housing is an appropriate use for the shoreline.

Interestingly, those who answered the survey were split about a hotel on the Albany waterfront - 35% agree hotels are appropriate, 37% disagree. But 85% of total attendees at the workshops placed a hotel, mostly a boutique hotel, on some spot on the waterfront. A hotel was favored for small footprint, good revenue and because there is no hotel in Albany.

Tiger pointed out that a boutique hotel (less than three hundred rooms) scored big with the public at the workshops, as did a modest amount of retail (250,000 square feet) with the hotel. She further offered her opinion that the hotel made the most sense on Fleming Point (the west side bluff over the water) both for its views and for its solid underlying rock for construction.

Tiger reported that the community disfavored any retail on Fleming Point. She also stated that residential, office, big box retail and manufacturing were all disfavored for the waterfront.

Other results favored: some expanded wetlands, boardwalks at wetlands, athletic areas, public restrooms and shuttle service to downtown Albany; LEED-certified requirement for any buildings, gray water recovery systems, photovoltaics and/or native plant landscaping on roofs and consideration of sea level rise. Built area should "support the primary objective of open space, preservation and outdoor recreation, while enhancing the unique qualities of the waterfront.”

What About Horse Racing?

Surprisingly, only about 9% of the participants favored keeping the horse racetrack at the Albany waterfront. Golden Gate Fields still runs horseracing now, and according to the track owners will continue to do so for the foreseeable future. However, most Albany residents are looking forward to a day when the track would be replaced with other uses.

What About the CESP/Sierra Club Vision?

In many respects the community’s vision was not that far off from the vision proposed over the past 15 years by Citizens for East Shore Parks (CESP), the Sierra Club, Audubon and Citizens for the Albany Shoreline (CAS). They had put forth a waterfront vision of 85% open space with about 15% of the land for development including a hotel and some retail, built on the east side of the site at least 700 feet away from the water.

Dissent from the Pro-Development Faction:

At the City Council meeting Monday night about ten pro-development speakers complained that the Report did not allow enough development to entice commercial builders and opposed the adoption of the Report.

For the Political Junkies:

Observing from the audience was a member of former State Senator Dion Aroner's lobbying and consulting firm, which represents Golden Gate Fields, and which spearheaded the track owner’s failed campaign to get approval of a mall development added to the racetrack in the mid 2000’s. Aroner’s firm helped organize one faction in Albany into a vociferous cheering squad for the track’s development proposal.

However, this effort to get the track’s shopping mall approved activated the community backlash that caused an electoral turnover, reinstating the environmental faction as the majority of the Albany City Council.

Patricia Jones is Executive Director of Citizens for East Shore Parks. Partisan Position articles are written by people who have taken an active advocacy role in what they're reporting on.

My wife and I just returned from a visit to New Orleans. While there, we toured some of the areas hardest hit by Hurricane Katrina in August 2005, and Hurricane Rita in September 2005. Rose Scott was our personable and knowledgeable guide for the tours. Rose, born and raised in New Orleans, is a retired high school teacher who now works as a tour guide. Katrina flooding and an oil spill rendered her St. Bernard Parish home uninhabitable.

Metro New Orleans is divided into four Parishes: Orleans; Jefferson; St. Bernard; and Plaquemine. A Parish is equivalent to a county.

Taking a guided tour left us feeling somewhat like a voyeur viewing human suffering. Yet, Rose assured us that New Orleans folk do not want America to let the horror of Katrina fade away. And, of course, the City needs tourist dollars.

My trip impressions are not intended to be comprehensive. Rather, I am reporting what I saw, heard, and read in The Times-Picayune.

We stayed in a hotel on Ursulines Avenue in the French Quarter. During our visit, we took the street car along St. Charles Avenue to the Garden District. Both the French Quarter and the Garden District are on high ground and, except for some wind damage, were largely unaffected by Katrina and Rita. Not long after the hurricanes, a tourist could drink, eat, and listen to music in the French Quarter and never see any of the damage caused by the hurricanes and the ongoing rebuilding.

When New Orleans was hit by Hurricane Katrina, extensive damage was caused by heavy rain, high winds, and then the Gulf of Mexico waters were pushed up the Mississippi into Lake Pontchartrain causing breaches in the levees and flood walls. A surge of water 30 to 35 feet high swept over many parts of New Orleans and then flooding up to 15 to 20 feet deep. After temporary repairs had been made to the levees and flood walls, the City began pumping the water out. Evacuees began returning to view the damage. Then Hurricane Rita hit, causing many of the temporary repairs to rupture and flooding to begin again.

About 1,836 people died in Hurricane Katrina.

Prior to Katrina, the population of New Orleans was about 485,000 with about 67 percent black. A year later in 2006, the Black population had dropped to 58 percent while the White population jumped from 26 to 34 percent. Will this new ratio of Blacks to Whites continue into the future? Some are calling this the “whiting” of New Orleans. Many Katrina/Rita victims were evacuated immediately after the storms and later many were relocated to other parts of Louisiana or to other states, including 160 to California. Almost five years later, the population of New Orleans is about 300,000, but 3 of the 4 Parishes have shrunk since Katrina.

Most of New Orleans is 3 to 8 feet below the Mississippi River and Lake Pontchartrain. About 80 percent of the city, covering 144 square miles, was flooded, destroying 204,737 homes. Most of the uninhabitable or blighted homes have been razed. However, New Orleans still has more blighted homes than any other major city by a wide margin. The wood and cement foundations are being ground up and used as landfill. We did see some cement foundations painted pink, indicating the cement was toxic requiring special treatment. Large grassy areas or cemented areas marked where homes, shopping strips, hospitals, schools, and office buildings once stood. Buildings had a water mark around them ten to 15 feet high, like a ring around a bathtub, indicating how high the water had risen. One can see holes punched through the roofs of some houses where people tried to stay above water and other houses had square holes cut in the roofs so rescue workers could pull people from their flooded homes.

After Katrina, teams went throughout New Orleans inspecting each building, placing marks on the door indicating the date of the inspection, who inspected the building, and the number of dead found in the building. It was a sobering sight to see homes with these markings.

About 270,000 autos became salvaged after sitting in salt water for weeks. They are being crushed and sold as scrap.

Katrina completely destroyed the only movie theater in St. Bernard Parish. During our visit, The Times-Picayune reported that a brand new multiplex theater would open in June, just in time for the release of Disney’s 3-D The Toy Story 3. The theater will continue the popular tradition of “dollar candy.” This will fill the need for family entertainment in the Parish.

Flood insurance is generally unavailable except through a national program. This month, Congress extended the national flood insurance program, which had lapsed. The lapse left many thousands of Louisiana homeowners without coverage and made it difficult for those in the process of buying a home to close the deal. With levee and floodwall repairs ongoing, no one would feel comfortable rebuilding or buying without flood insurance. Residents are rebuilding with their collective fingers crossed.

Louisiana established “The Road Home” program to provide compensation to Louisiana homeowners affected by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. The Road Home program is the largest single housing recovery program in U.S. history. The Road Home program disbursed $8.44 billion to 127,159 applicants. The applicants agreed to rebuild and reoccupy their homes within three years. Unfortunately, the state calculated the grants based on pre-hurricane home values, and not on the construction costs that exploded after the hurricanes. HUD ruled that grant money had to be paid in a lump sum, rather, as the state wanted, in installments as work was completed. As a result, many grantees did not meet the three-year requirement. It is unclear how many took the money and ran and those who just need additional help to rebuild. The state is now in the position of taking possession of many of these properties in lieu of return of the grant money and then putting them up for auction.

Many homeowners rebuilt using drywall manufactured in China. It turned out this drywall makes occupants sick, corrodes metal fixtures, and renders homes unfit to live in. The cost to tear out the drywall is estimated at $116,000 per house. About 700 to 1,000 families are affected. There is litigation pending, but it is doubtful whether successful litigants can compel payment from Chinese firms. And insurance companies have largely been denying claims.

Actor Brad Pitt is a well respected figure in New Orleans. Pitt spent much time in the city prior to Katrina and he and Angelina Jolie bought a home in the French Quarter after Katrina. In 2007, frustrated by the slow pace of rebuilding in the Lower Ninth, Pitt set up the “Make It Right” foundation; the foundation then commissioned 13 architectural firms to design affordable, green houses. The organization plans to build 150 homes, all for returning Lower Ninth residents. So far, just 15 of them are occupied, but those 15 make a big impression. It’s impossible to miss the Brad Pitt Houses, as everyone there calls them. They are sprawling, angular buildings in bold hues.

We also passed through the new Musicians’ Village, the inspiration of two New Orleans-born luminaries – singer-pianist Harry Connick Jr. and saxophonist Branford Marsalis – consists of a cluster of about eighty brightly painted homes mostly for musicians, but for other artists too.

Katrina devastated most of the City’s school buildings and supplies. The vast majority of schoolchildren enrolled in schools in other parts of Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas where they are known as the “Hurricane Kids.” In late 2008, almost 30,000 students attended K-12 – about 55 percent of pre-Katrina enrollment. A vast majority of the schoolchildren experienced a period of dislocation, trauma, and personal loss.

As of June 2009, 27 of 39 hospitals were opened.

Work on the levees and flood walls, and drainage systems is continuing. But the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has yet to provide Congress with a list of projects to protect New Orleans and other areas of Louisiana’s coastline from catastrophic hurricanes. It is estimated that the cost of providing protection for the state’s coast will be between $70 to $136 billion. Do you protect from just a “modest” Category 5 hurricane – a so-called 400-year storm that would have a 0.25 percent chance of occurring like Katrina, or a much stronger Category 5 hurricane – a 1,000-year storm with a 0.1 percent chance of occurring in any year? And what should Louisiana’s coastline look like in light of the continuing loss of 24 square miles of wetlands along the coast each year and the fact that the Mississippi River carries only half the land-building sediment it did 100 years ago? These are questions Congress and Louisiana are now grappling with.

For those interested in the before, during, and shortly after Hurricane Katrina, I highly recommend Spike Lee’s four-hour documentary, When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts (HBO). I also recommend 1 Dead in Attic by Chris Rose. Rose was a columnist with The Times-Picayune, who wrote a collection of short stories recounting the first harrowing year and a half of life in New Orleans after Katrina. In 2006, he was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Distinguished Commentary and was awarded a share of The Times-Picayune staff’s Pulitzer for Public Service. Finally, I recommend the 10-part drama Treme by The Wire creator, David Simon, now showing on HBO about life in New Orleans in the aftermath of Katrina.

San Francisco Chronicle columnist Tim Goodman described Treme as “a love letter with bruises.” We have thoroughly enjoyed the first two episodes. While walking in the Treme area of the City, we stumbled on the Treme crew filming a segment of the drama. Treme has been renewed for a second season.

The citizens of New Orleans have shown resilience and are moving forward, but with some trepidation. New Orleans is underfunded, undereducated, impoverished, with little tax base and a dysfunctional infrastructure. As New Orleans mayor-elect Mitch Landrieu recently remarked, “New Orleans is the symbol of America’s inability to do big things. It has become the symbol of America’s inability to think, to plan, to invest, to understand not only in physical capital but in human capital as well. We as a government – federal, state, local – have not done the job that needs to be done.”

“If there was no New Orleans, America would just be a bunch of free people dying of boredom.” (Judy Deck, a New Orleans resident).

PHOENIX, AZ - On Thursday, April 29, 2010 at 11:00 a.m. (MST), MALDEF, the American Civil Liberties Union, the ACLU of Arizona and the National Immigration Law Center (NILC) will hold a news conference on the House lawn of the State Capitol Grounds in Phoenix, Arizona to announce that they are preparing to challenge Arizona's extreme new law, which requires law enforcement to question people about their immigration status during everyday police encounters and criminalizes immigrants for failing to carry their "papers." The unconstitutional law, the groups say, encourages racial profiling, endangers public safety and betrays American values.

Speakers will include Thomas A. Saenz, MALDEF President and General Counsel; Alessandra Soler Meetze, Executive Director of the ACLU of Arizona; Dolores Huerta, co-founder of the United Farm Workers of America; Richard Chavez, civil rights leader; Linton Joaquin, General Counsel of the National Immigration Law Center (NILC) and multi-Grammy winning artist and human rights advocate, Linda Ronstadt.

Fifteen years ago, the same three civil rights groups successfully challenged Proposition 187 in the state of California, where a voter-approved initiative required proof of legal status to access virtually all public services. The enactment of Prop 187, as it was commonly referred, tore apart schools and communities across the state as fear and suspicion became pervasive, and the state wasted tens of millions of dollars defending a law ultimately struck down as unconstitutional.

The massive and shocking Haiti earthquake of January 12, 2010 is still periodically in the news, with much of the current focus on the human suffering and efforts at recovery. It was the fourth most deadly earthquake anywhere since 1900.

The geological underpinnings and lessons of the magnitude 7.0 event that shattered the Haitian capital will be explored Wednesday April 28, this week, in a special lecture at UC Berkeley.

The Lawson Lecture, sponsored by the Berkeley Seismological Laboratory, is an annual event, honoring Berkeley professor of geology Andrew Lawson, who did much to advance the science of earthquake studies by leading a careful and extensive review of the 1906 Earthquake in San Francisco. (He also named the San Andreas Fault).

Each year a distinguished expert is invited to give the lecture on a timely aspect of earthquakes. While the Lawson Lectures are on technical topics they are typically presented in a way accessible to the layperson.

This year, the lecture will be given Wednesday, April 28, at 4:00 pm by Bay Area based Carol Prentice, a research geologist with the U.S. Geological Survey. She spent four weeks in Haiti earlier this year.

“The details of the 12 January event held many surprises from a scientific perspective, but the inevitability of earthquakes this size in this region is no surprise, and the tragic loss of life due to poor construction practices is also no surprise”, reads the announcement for the event.

The Lawson lecture is free and open to the public. It will be held this year in the Banatao Auditorium, Room 310 Sutardja Dai Hall on the UC Berkeley campus.

(The new building is the large, brown, building just south of Hearst and Le Roy on the northern edge of the campus. If you enter the campus by North Gate, off Euclid, turn east—towards the hills—beyond brown shingle North Gate Hall and go straight ahead to Sutardja Dai Hall along the adjacent roadway.)

The lecture starts at 4:00 p.m. “exactly”. Doors open at 3:30. It will also be live broadcast on the web. Click mms://media.citris.berkeley.edu/CACS after 3:00 pm on Wednesday to watch.

The Berkeley Seismological Laboratory webpage is at http://seismo.berkeley.edu/

The Lawson Lecture link is highlighted in bright green on the right, just below a fascinating periodic feature called “Today in Earthquake History.” (The most recent entry, for April 17, describes how on that date in 1889 German astronomer in Potsdam noticed a strangely swinging pendulum, and was able to later connect that movement to an earthquake in Japan, demonstrating that seismic waves travel vast distances through the earth.)

It’s not surprising that Republicans oppose the Obama Administration – they want to suck up to the rich by maintaining the status quo. And it’s not surprising that they lie – this is, after all, the Party that created the fictional Iraqi atomic bomb threat so they would have a winning issue in the 2002 mid-term elections. What is surprising is that they’ve been so successful. Why are Republican supporters so enthusiastic when they’ve been force-fed a diet of BS?

The Republican master plan is hauntingly reminiscent of Hitler’s Big Lie philosophy: “Never leave room for alternatives; never accept blame; concentrate on one enemy at a time and blame him for everything that goes wrong; people will believe a big lie sooner than a little one; and if you repeat it frequently enough people will sooner or later believe it.” It’s based on the immoral stance: “the ends justify the means.”

During the 2009 Presidential campaign, the GOP big lie program started rumors that Obama had not been born in the US, was a Muslim, and palled around with terrorists. It worked! A recent Louis Harris poll of Republicans found that 67 percent “believe that Obama is a socialist.” 57 percent “believe that Obama is a Muslim.” 45 percent believe that Obama “was not born in the United States and so is not eligible to be president."

Once Obama became President, the Republican propaganda machine claimed Democrats were responsible for the financial collapse – that stemmed from Bush era mismanagement – and favored bailouts for Wall Street because Obama was a liberal elitist.

During the yearlong healthcare debate, the GOP lie machine generated a series of nasty falsehoods: “death panels,” Washington bureaucrats interfering with the doctor-patient relationship, seniors losing Medicare coverage, and so forth. Meanwhile, Republican Senators feigned cooperation, dragging on deliberations with the intent of killing the healthcare bill by attrition.

Now Republicans – guided by conservative pollster Frank Luntz – are opposing financial reform with another big lie assault: the Democratic plan would produce future bailouts, create a massive government bureaucracy, and stifle small businesses.

During the past fifteen months, the Tea Party developed, a faux movement bankrolled by archconservatives such as the Koch brothers, in order to mobilize resentment among hard-core Republicans who’d been turned off by the McCain campaign. They serve the same function for the GOP in the US that the Basij volunteers do for Ahmadinejad in Iran. They hassle the opposition, pal around with militias, and serve as a conduit for relentless negativism. Tea Party activists swallow the Republican lies, hook, line, and sinker.

There are five reasons for their energy and gullibility: First, none of them voted for Obama, so it’s easy for them to believe he won by cheating and to blame him for everything that’s gone wrong since – including The Great Recession that had its roots in the Bush Administration. A recent NEW YORK TIMES Tea Party poll found that 57 percent of Tea Party adherents – most of whom are Republicans – had a favorable opinion of former President Bush. Only 7 percent had a favorable opinion of President Obama.

Second, it’s easier to attack public policy than it is to propose practical solutions. Republicans malign the Democratic financial reform plan because they don’t have any alternatives. Meanwhile, Tea Party adherents are angry about the way things are going in Washington and want to reduce the size of government; 90 percent believe “the country is headed in the wrong direction.”

Third, Republicans have historically played to the myth of “rot at the top,” and it’s convenient to do this again. Tea Party adherents hate the bailouts, see the economy as “very bad,” and blame Congress, Wall Street, and the Obama Administration. They oppose financial reform because they don’t trust the Federal government.

Fourth, in his classic political study What’s the Matter with Kansas Tom Frank noted that fiscal conservatives – favoring deregulation and lower taxes – constantly bamboozle social conservatives – favoring social issues such as abortion and gay rights – by using the theme of victimization. They blame America’s problems on the “’liberal elite,’ … they eschew economic reasons in favor of accusing this elite of simply hating America, or having a desire to harm ‘average’ Americans.” The big liars are using victimization again: 77 percent of Tea Party adherents see Obama as “very liberal,” 89 percent feel he has expanded the power of government “too much,” and 92 percent believe he is moving the country towards socialism.

Finally, there’s the role of race. Barack Obama is America’s first African-American President and the Tea Party movement has become a haven for racists. 89 percent of Tea Party adherents are white; 52 percent believe “too much has been made of the problems facing black people,” and 25 percent believe Obama “favors blacks over whites.”

The Republican big lie campaign is immoral. It’s fomenting class and racial conflict. It’s created a Washington environment where GOP politicians have abandoned America’s long-term interests for short-term political gain.

It’s time to call out the Republican big lie strategy. It’s un-American.

Bob Burnett is a Berkeley writer. He can be reached at bobburnett@comcast.net

Opinion

Editorials

The question of how to provide a sustainable information source for a small city in a metropolitan area is ongoing around here. It’s a subset of what now constitutes news, since even on a national level the main “news” outlets are increasingly aggregators (an insider word meaning collectors) of news stories created in other media. The ratio of “new news” to repeats on sites like the Huffington Post is small.

In Berkeley, in addition to the Planet, there are at least three print papers with online adjuncts and at least one ambitious blog which attempt to deliver the news you need to know. For all of them, soft news, lifestyle copy about home and hearth and fancy food is the easiest to acquire, often without much compensation to the writer, and it fills up a lot of space—which online is virtually infinite.

Every publication these days is deluged with electronic press releases. It’s been the longstanding habit of newspapers everywhere to simply re-write these, possibly making one or two phone calls, and re-labelling the product “news”, as if it were the product of a stellar staff of trained newhounds.

Many of these press releases are well written and not misleading, and economy of effort suggests that they should just be passed on intact to the reading public. We’ve been experimenting with this around here, putting online verbatim copies, clearly labeled “press release” for truth in packaging. The best candidates for this treatment are releases from artists, arts organizations, government agencies and advocacy groups. Press offices at universities have for many years produced excellent articles about research topics, particularly in the sciences, and there’s no good reason not to offer them honestly and directly to the reader without re-writing.

But what about real news? In fact, what is real news? Crime and accident stories would seem to count as real news, yet those also are often re-writes of agency press releases. Realistically, with Public Information Officers in police departments firmly in control, it’s almost impossible for reporters at short-staffed publications—almost all of them these days—to get much more information than these officers are willing to divulge. Again, it seems more honest simply to link to the press releases, and only to run a story if a reporter can make contact with someone not mentioned in the press release.

Which leaves events, for example city council meetings. Here things happen in real time: plans presented, votes taken. It’s been customary for local news reporters to attend such meetings and in addition to reporting what’s going on up on the dais, to chat with proponents and exponents in the halls about agenda items. But with the advent of streaming video it’s possible to report off-site, and also possible for the citizen with an avid interest in the proceedings to watch them at home either in progress or the next day.

This week’s Berkeley City Council meeting provides an excellent case in point. It featured only one agenda item where there was any suspense about the outcome, though an item providing some information about how the city staff wants to use housing funds was interesting to watch.

At least three publications or blogs provided information about Who was there and What happened. This week the Planet launched a new feature, compact summaries of stories and links to press releases or full accounts in other media, so our online readers were able to quickly get the Who and the What about the zoning appeal of a permit for a massive house proposed for 2707 Rose Street.

Even though I watched the whole affair online, we elected not to duplicate the adequate factual accounts in other media. Taken together, the three versions of the story provided some nice quotes, pictures and details about what happened, and the blog devoted a lot of wordspace to reaction comments, some of which were intelligent.

But what was lacking in the sum total was the Why. The blog responders and two of the stories touched on the central lesson which could have been extracted from watching the action, but didn’t exactly hit the nail on the head. They missed the important kernel of information: The city staff and the council majority chose to blithely ignore the very clear requirements of the California Environmental Quality Act, a reckless decision that may well come back to haunt the city and us taxpayers.

The attorney for the appellants was Susan Brandt Hawley, probably the leading litigator in the whole state for cases which link the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) and preservation, often of historic resources. She and her many neighborhood clients were given only ten minutes to make their whole case, and she had to divide those with her geotechnical expert. But she has often taught continuing education classes for California Bar members (some of which I’ve attended) so she’s good at coming clearly to the point in a hurry.

Here’s what she told the council: “If there is any evidence before you, facts or reasonable assumptions based on facts or expert opinions, that there might be a significant environmental impact, you can’t exempt this from CEQA.” Period.

“It’s really a legal question, and I don’t think Mr. Cowan disagrees with me, or Ms. Rickles. The lawyers here agree,” she said. She went on, and no one contradicted her, that “it’s the ‘fair argument’standard:…what you’re looking for here tonight is whether in fact there may be a significant environmental impact.”

In other words, if anyone has made a fair argument that the project may violate some aspect of CEQA, an Environmental Impact Report (EIR) to examine the data is required. Not optional. As City Attorney Zach Cowan knows full well, which is why he waffled inconclusively when someone asked him about it on Tuesday.

Only Councilmembers Arreguin and Worthington demonstrated a mature, intelligent grasp of the legal questions which were before the body. Their colleagues offered inexpert opinions on architecture, aesthetics, history and traffic, with very little data and a lot of speculation on matters clearly beyond their personal expertise.

All of the council majority’s fluffy opinions about whether or not you might be able to see the house from the road, and all of the staff’s backtracking about whether or not their own regulations mandated the use of story poles to gauge the height of the proposed building were irrelevant to the central proposition which Brandt Hawley clearly advanced. She emphasized that credible evidence that appellants had presented regarding the project’s impact on historic resources (both the house to be demolished and the neighboring historic houses) and about the geology of the building site added up to enough doubt to trigger the requirement for a full EIR.

Mayor Bates summed up the majority attitude toward the CEQA standard as it pertained to historic resources: “As far as the landmarks commission, I don’t know exacty what happened, but ultimately we are charged, the council is charged, with whether we believe something is a landmark or not, and I believe that every member of this council, everyone one of us has been to the site, so we’ve all seen the site… so I think that’s a false issue.”

Well, no. It’s the main issue. CEQA cares not a whit whether Mayor Bates or any of the council members believes something is a landmark or not. As long as there’s a credible contention to the contrary, an EIR is required.

Brandt Hawley asked that a public hearing be scheduled to further examine the evidence, and that would have been a simple effective alternative to the slam-bam-thank-you-ma’am way the council dealt with the conflict. The staff had already acknowledged that their report contained major errors, and no one seemed to be able to find the letter about the historic questions which the Landmarks Commission had attempted to put into evidence—which won’t look very good for the city if the case ever gets into court.

Several council members gushed about what lovely people live near the lovely site, accomplished, educated people all…but what no one said is that most neighbors are also, to put it politely, very well-fixed. Some are even world-renowned lawyers. If disgruntled neighbors who could afford it decided to sue to require the city to enforce the California Environmental Quality Act requirements on the applicant, it could be a very costly boondoggle for the taxpayers.

Another story with an accompanying commentary which the Planet ran this week could teach the council and the public something. The majority of the Richmond city council decided to let Chevron, the big dog on the block, get away with a perfunctory EIRfor a proposed expansion project.

Richmond council members got a lesson in CEQA from the appeals court which the Berkeley City Council members might have to learn for themselves the hard way.

That’s the kind of Why which should be part of reporting on what happens every week, but it’s not easy for overworked reporters to do. In this particular instance I have the advantage of a law degree and years of experience on the Landmarks Preservation Commission, but in many other situations I’d be just as baffled as anyone else. Reporters used to have regular beats that they stayed on for years so that they could educate themselves about the ins and outs of what they were reporting on, but in this brave new world it’s a lot harder to become an expert.

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All great minds think alike. Someone else is on a similar kick this morning.

The Editor's Back Fence

This is one busy week for the civic-minded amongst us. I had originally thought to do a preview, without comment, in the news section, of some of the wide selection of meetings that the conscientious Berkeleyan who wanted to be influential or just well informed could attend this week, but I find that I am constitutionally unable to comply with the “without comment”stipulation, so as we move through the week you’ll find some notes on what’s happening and why you should care.

There’s the usual Berkeley City Council meeting on Tuesday. If you don’t want to shlep down to the Maudelle Shirek Building (Old City Hall), you can watch it online or on cable TV, or see it in recorded form later.

The agenda gives you a window into what might happen, including links to most of the documents the councilmembers have found in their packet. Unfortunately, there are often last minute additions which don’t appear online—perhaps the Sunshine Ordinance initiative will be able to correct this problem.

The hot ticket item this week is the appeal of the Zoning Adjustment Board’s decision to let old school Cambridge software magnate Mitch Kapor build his McMansion West, or possibly a McHeadquarters , in the nicest part of the Berkeley Hills. The staff report runs to an unbelievable 320 pages, with 73 letters from concerned citizens listed. Unlike the Planning Commission, the City Council does not put all these letters online(Sunshine Alert) but some of the best ones have appeared in this space in the last few weeks.

The consensus seems to be that the building will be big and ugly, and that the process by which it was approved looked more like “greasing the skids for a celebrity” than like “fair and balanced”. I haven’t bothered to go up there myself to check out the site, but I can’t help observing that my friends in the flats(on Berkeley Way behind the Trader Joe’s extravaganza at MLK and University for example) are routinely being asked to put up with much bigger, much uglier structures in their neighborhoods these days, with hundreds instead of possible tens of occupants and housing retail businesses with underground garages for many cars instead of the possible foundation office with a 10-car garage which has been rumored to be contemplated for the Kapor complex. The possibility that Kapor’s neighbors might lose a bit of their view of the bay seems to have caused more consternation than the certainty that Berkeley Way neighbors have lost most of their view of the sunlight. This doesn’t make either project right, and this isn’t intended as a stirring cry for class warfare, but maybe it’s time to think about whether the hills should be taking their fair share of increased density, if we really do want to make Berkeley even more crowded than it already is. Perhaps the Kapors could be persuaded to take in some boarders in their big new house?

On Wednesday the eager activist has three good choices for raising his or her adrenaline level. The school board meets to discuss a variety of more or less controversial items: classified employee layoffs, the agreement between BUSD and the Berkeley Federation of Teachers, a proposal for a new small school at: Berkeley High, a “Green Academy, which has shocked some ideologues because it’s being funded in part by PG&E This meeting will be in the administration building on the Berkeley High Campus, starting at 7.

And speaking of ideologues, a full quotient will be represented UC Berkeley’s ASUC Senate meeting tonight. Our best guess about where and when can be found on the (not impartial) Middle East Children’s Alliance website.

The ongoing discussion is whether the Senate wants to override its president’s veto of a resolution divesting ASUC funds from a couple of weapons manufacturers who sell arms to Israel. The time and place of the last three meetings of this group on this topic changed around a lot, so this is only a guess, and last week the meeting was closed to the public and the press anyway(Brown Act Alert).

If you’re a true glutton for punishment and have a pair of roller skates, there’s even a third meeting you could attend on Wednesday night: the Planning Commission work session on West Berkeley, starting at 6 pm at the North Berkeley Senior Center, followed by the regular Planning Commission meeting, which will take up cell towers and the height of buildings downtown, both of which topics have their avid groupies.

Then on Thursday,April 29, the Council has scheduled a special meeting at 7:00 P.M. at Longfellow Middle School, 1500 Derby Street (at Sacramento).

The announced purpose is to discuss the Bus Rapid Transit Build Alternative, an in-group controversy with very excited participants who were shunted to the end of the evening at the last regular city council meeting. For this one the city provides no links to staff reports in the agenda itself. (Sunshine Ordinance Alert). Cynics are saying that the meeting has been moved by the Mayor and his council allies to a harder-to-get-to location to fend off the crowd of angry neighbors and merchants from the targeted Telegraph avenue route for AC Transit’s big building project who came to the last City Council meeting. They say too that building trade operatives are being brought in from all over the place to tout the project as a source of construction jobs.

Possibly it’s time, in the interest of responding intelligently to climate change imperatives, to consider the actual usefulness of big building projects like AC’s current BRT plan, and not just think about how many short-term jobs such projects can generate. If, as the Rapid Bus Plus advocates say, we can get the same amount of transportation improvement without laying down all that concrete, why not at least evaluate this theory as part of the Environmental Impact process?

That’s enough excitement for the most devoted civic watchdog. If you’re one of them, and you go to any of these stirring events, how about producing a short report on the action and sending it to editor@berkeleydailyplanet.com ? Your stay-at-home fellow citizens would appreciate it.

Public Comment

The odd-shaped new hybrid cars racing around the roads give me hope that someday driving won’t always be considered such a deep insult to the planet. The word hybrid has an intriguing tone; old and new in combination, possibly representative of things green, sustainable and good.

So I was fascinated to read that the UC Berkeley’s athletics program was now a hybrid. The sports programs used to be considered “auxiliary”, an April report explained, which meant they had to be financially self-sufficient.

But now, under the new “hybrid” status, they can use money meant for academic programs and enjoy a new, more flexible financial standard.

Sports programs which used to have to raise their own funds through ticket prices and fees can now, according to the report, use more general campus funds previously reserved for academic departments.

It still may annoy the Academic Senate that sports programs enjoy subsidies while academic courses are cut and instructors are laid off, but the semantic sleight of hand reduces the impression of fiduciary impropriety.

UC Berkeley’s willingness to redefine accounting vocabulary to excuse misplaced financial priorities inspires awe in this alumna, especially against the backdrop of Goldman Sachs employees testifying before congress that betting against their own financial instruments is perfectly legal and reasonable.

The unilateral move of athletics programs from auxiliary to hybrid status is undeniably impressive. The football team may have been an embarrassment this year, but I must say, this hybrid stuff is a really good game

Carol Denney

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Smyth-Fernwald Situation

This is in response to Mr. Michael Stephens’ opinion piece posted April 13th entitled “Just love the Hysteria.” His letter contains several inaccuracies and misrepresentations which I would like to address.

In his critique of my letter from the previous week entitled “UC Plans to Destroy Smyth-Fernwald,” Mr. Stephens erroneously claims that I had “no suggestions” to make other than that UC was planning a “seismic installation” at the Smyth-Fernwald property. In truth, I had a great deal to suggest. I cite numerous examples and provide a significant body of evidence signaling UC’s intent to destroy Smyth-Fernwald. I also explain my opposition thereof. The already installed “seismic device” mentioned was described only as a precursor to the imminent destruction which, as I predicted, has indeed already begun.

Mr. Stephens then goes on to describe me as “hysterical,” “confused” and “paranoid,” for my referring to Smyth-Fernwald as an “irreplaceable treasure,” and an area of “ecological significance.” I even managed to elicit a “laugh out loud” reaction to my assertions that the natural beauty and fragility of the area should be preserved rather than destroyed. Mr. Stephens cites his reasons for such mirth as….1) The area is largely unknown and rarely visited by Berkeley residents, and…2) The area sits adjacent to a protected parkland, (therefore rendering it, presumably, not deserving of protection itself.) Without expending dozens of words in explanation, I believe most educated people will agree that the ecological value, significance or importance of an area is not measured by human visitation, nor predicated on its proximity to already protected lands or waterways.

I have received other, more reasonable reactions to my letter. I was contacted by the Berkeley Architectural Heritage Association in which they expressed their dismay over the possible loss of the historically precious Smyth House, which they have discovered to be even older than previously believed, having most likely been built in the 1860s. BAHA explained, however, there is nothing they can do, as UC is “a law unto itself.” I have also heard from 2 property owner groups whose properties lie adjacent to Smyth-Fernwald along Hamilton Creek. Here, “deer graze, wild turkeys display” and even “wild fox” have been seen. I was told that these owners “benefit from the wildness,” and are seeking to “join with other owners in permanently protecting the area.” Perhaps Mr. Stephens will laugh out loud to learn that these property owners are concerned with preserving the value of their properties, as well as maintaining their quality of life. How hysterical of them.

Because the intent of Mr. Stephen’s letter was clearly more about deriding me for my “sensitive soul” environmentalism, rather than offering coherent arguments against it, I can only surmise that he was simply p.o.’d over my criticisms of his beloved alma mater, UCB. Speaking of which, evidence has recently come to light from old Berkeley City Council records, that there was an agreement between the University and the city of Berkeley in 1946, designating the Smyth-Fernwald property to be kept as a “parkland” and an “open buffer” zone between Hillside and UC. However, now UC claims they cannot find any such document. Wow, what a surprise! But realistically, it wouldn’t matter anyway. No written agreement, or even environmental law is going to stop UC from arrogantly wielding its power and doing whatever it wants, Berkeley citizenry be damned.

Kevin Moore

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Housing Advocates Oppose 1200 Ashby Deal

There are actually a lot of HAC members who are against allowing 1200 Ashby from being built. This mostly stems from the building hogging section 8 credits from other deserving building projects, also the question of the plans showing that this is as it stands not a Senior Housing facility. Anyone can go to the Planning Dept. and check this out. Also, some members are just waiting for June 30th to roll around and disappear the development for the time being at least.

With this in mind, I believe that along with making the plan changes I wrote about in my first letter to make this actually a senior housing facility. I also think that up to 32 apartments ( no studios are shown in the plans, a mistake )should be removed and intermittent lounges should be planned for.

As a 47 year veteran of architectural practice and having worked with many developers in the past, it appears in my opinion that this is a "move to market" development and I believe that as soon as he can (when the market improves) he will attempt to remove it from senior housing rolls.

I think if most of these changes (and those from my first letter) are made, staff, commission, council and the people of Berkeley will stand behind it.

Alan (Avram) Gur Arye

retired architect

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The Answer is Plastics

In the SF Chronicle, April 28, a front page story is about plastic toys being banned in Santa Clara County over concerns of their contributing to childhood obesity. The main concern should be for their contributing to the expanding environmental overload of plastics already causing floating plastic garbage patches over thousands of square miles of Pacific and Atlantic oceans. These toys made of non-biodegradable plastic quickly get broken, lost or thrown away to end up going to our dumps or worse, if loose on the ground as they may in rainfall events get carried to streams or drains eventually getting to the oceans. Floating around whole or in pieces some plastic gets mistaken for food by fish, which end up with their guts jammed up and unable to take in real food. Several ocean conservation groups have pictures of fish collected with their guts crammed with plastic. I urge readers to get action in Alameda and other counties to do what Santa Clara County has done, and I propose further action to get the chains to substitute plastic food containers with biodegradable containers.

Another point to go with this is that the federal govt. has no office or agency to develop a comprehensive best program to handle our waste messes especially organic wastes and sewage. In the UK two different offices have been established to develop wastes strategies. I urge readers to call on their federal elected officials to get such an agency going; perhaps posting a comment on Obama's Whitehouse website might get some attention quickly if more than a few comments get posted there.

One action for such an agency quickly to consider might be "strip mining" as it were of the plastics on the oceans, at least in the part with the thickest piling up of plastics, especially the middle of the patch in the Pacific ocean as an eddying action keeps pushing outlying plastics to the center. Just about all plastic that floats is of the 1-7 recyclable type that can be burned with just carbon dioxide being given off to generate electricity. A surface skimming, which the US Coast Guard was supposedly trying, would get a coal-like fuel without coal mining dangers that have gotten much recent attention due to deaths at several mines, without environmental scars from blowing off mountain tops or from dumping mine wastes, and without mercury emissions. The collected plastic might be gotten cheaper than mined coal so that the cost of collecting it could be recovered, perhaps even with some profit being made, and many extra benefits for the environment would occur with getting plastic from being eaten by fish.

Dr. J. Singmaster,

Ret. Environmental Chemist

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Accountability on Wall Street

# The Wall Street Accountability Act will regulate shadow markets that previously escaped regulators and hold big banks and financial institutions accountable for their own decisions and make them plan ahead for possible losses and also assure tax payers they won't be stuck bailing out banks again.It will also give shareholders new power to stop exorbitant bonuses that reward executive failures. Finally, it would require banks and non-lending institutions to provide clear, understandable information to consumers.

In addition, it would require complicated derivative transactions to take place in an open, transparent way.

Amity Buxton

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Oppose Smart Meters

PGE is installing Smart Meters on Alameda County homes and businesses, often without residents’ consent. State Senator Dean Florez has called for a moratorium due to inordinate billing increases. Sebastopol requested a moratorium citing concerns about health and radio frequency radiation, reading accuracy, and interference with appliances. In light of those issues, lack of security and vulnerability to hackers, or inadequate privacy, Alameda County residents may wish to sign a petition to the Alameda County Board of Supervisors and City Councils, Assemblymember Nancy Skinner, State Senator Loni Hancock, Governor Schwarzenegger, and the California Public Utilities Commission. The petition requests that they:

1. Call for an immediate moratorium on the installation of Smart Meters;

2. Thoroughly investigate the program and the six concerns above by holding public hearings and requiring independent testing;

3. Require PGE to submit a characterization study of the system planned for Alameda County;

4. Allow customers to "opt out" of program; and

5. Call for a moratorium on the disposal, recycling, or permanent alteration of the old meters.

Here is the online petition: petitiononline.com For people who prefer a paper petition, that is often an option at the north Berkeley farmers' market on Thursday afternoons.

Everyone's celebrating the Governor's "pledge" to save the Cal Grant... everyone except for students, that is. The pledge to save the Cal grant doesn't save anything at all. In fact, it hurts low income students and their families.

If you dissect this “pledge,” the truth reveals the Governor has made another empty statement that still cuts funding to higher education. In his official statement, the Governor says: “I will not sign a budget without those increases in there,” referring to his January budget proposal. Let’s break it down. First, Schwarzenegger stated that he will not cut from the $2 billion he proposed in January. This alleged increase actually is a reimbursement to this year’s budget from last year to supplement the mandated enrollment growth increases. As for the Cal Grant, the Governor said that he would not sign a budget that makes any additional cuts to the Cal Grant than the budget that he proposed in January. Looking at his January proposal, this means that eliminating the Competitive Cal Grant, decoupling the Cal Grant from fee increases (leaving a $3,000 gap), and capping the income ceiling limit are still on the table. If there were any additional cuts made to Schwarzenegger’s January proposal, the Cal Grant program would be destroyed.

In short, students will still be burdened with being billed $10,000 for fees without having a secure source of financial aid to help pay for it.

Saving funding for higher education and the Cal Grant was originally a demand that students made during meetings with the Governor at UCSA’s Lobby Day on March 1st and through mobilizations made at the capitol and across campuses during the year. On Lobby Day, the Governor pledged to save the Competitive Cal Grant if there was an increase in revenue from tax receipts. On Tax Day, there was a 3.9% increase from receipts, which would be able to fund the Competitive Cal Grant. California’s tax-paying families have upheld our part of the bargain, why hasn’t the Governor?

Students feel cheated and frustrated with the Governor failing to keep his promise. The Governor is perpetuating a broken system that he helped create where the state funds prisons more than higher education. Students will not stand for this. We will take action until he keeps his word and gives what is owed to us. We're going to hold the Governor accountable to his promise to restore the Cal Grant and increase support for higher education.

The University of California Student Association is the official voice of over 200,000 undergraduate, graduate, and professional students from the eleven UC campuses. It is our mission to advocate on behalf of current and future students for the accessibility, affordability, and quality of the University of California system.

I remain shocked, furious, and appalled by what's been done to the American people and how impervious the banking system and others who aren't living where and how we are in the age of job loss, rising prices, home losses, all the outcomes of the banks' cavalier disregard of those who don't hold the same priivilege--especially legal privilege.

Ms. Ria Tanz Kubota

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FREEDOM

How often so many have ranted,

While taking their freedom for granted.

Complaints of despair

On foundations of air.

After losing it, how they've recanted!

Ove Ofteness

***

So, does David Jackson still think Tony Prone is "everything that a police officer should be" now that he has been fired and may face additional charges? When I think of the ideal law enforcement officer, he is someone like Dash Butler, the interim BART chief of police, who replaced the ineffective and incompetent Gary Gee. Butler, a former Berkeley chief of police, is known for strong community relations. Just two weeks after a large demonstration was held demanding Pirone be held accountable for his actions, Butler took decisive action.

I must say, it's pretty interesting to read Jackson's Feb. 18 letter to the Planet the day after Pirone's firing. Jackson calls Pirone a "stand-up guy." Well, his testimony sure didn’t stand up in court. At the preliminary hearing in 2009, he was forced to admit the video showed Grant had his hands behind his back when he was shot, though initially he stated otherwise. Jackson, a family friend of Pirone, says the ex-officer was "an intelligent, friendly, caring person." Sure he is. He cared enough about Grant to refuse to administer CPR after the shooting. His overzealous use of force would seem to disqualify him from MENSA membership. He certainly wasn’t too friendly to Grant or his friend Mike Greer, both of whom he assaulted.

Jackson goes on to blame Grant for his own death, a stereotypical response, but not the correct one. Grant was no angel. But that's no excuse to violate his civil rights. Eyewitnesses say Grant attempted to calm the situation down, he complied by putting his hands out after Pirone slammed him to the ground, and he pleaded for his life while Pirone had his boot on his neck, just before he was shot to death by Mehserle. Pirone's actions were clearly over the top. After all, there was no justification to even Tase Grant in the first place, by Pirone's own admission on the stand.

Pirone collected over $100,000 on paid leave for 13 months, at a time when BART is facing a considerable deficit, and considering service cuts, layoffs, and fare increases. If there is a single root cause of the agency's plummeting public image and loss of public confidence, it's Pirone. If he's truly a stand-up guy, he should start telling the truth about what happened that night. But then again, he doesnt have to. We can just roll the tape.

Eric Arnold

***

As self-proclaimed restaurant critic for the Berkeley Daily Planet (which may come as a surprise to the editors), I'm happy to announce the welcome addition of a new restaurant on Telegraph Avenue. Offering fine Italian cuisine, Pasta Bene, at 2565 Telegraph Avenue is a gem! Located in the former Eclair Bakery, next to the Center for Independent Living, this family owned restaurant is a lovely state of the art building with comfortable booths and tables and outdoor seating, ideal for warm, sunny days.

The menu is truly impressive, with starters, salads, sandwiches, thin crust Italian style pizza, and entrees as low as $6.95. I ask, where do you find prices like this? Oh, yes -- for dessert, there's Tiramisu, something to die for. The charming young hostess and attentive waiter literally kill you with kindness, making sure you're pleased with your selection. This is the kind of restaurant where one can happily linger for hours, enjoying the view of people passing along Telegraph Avenue, always a show of its own.

You may just want to stop in Pasta Bene some afternoon for a draft of beer, only $13 a pitcher.

Dorothy Snodgrass

***

In Arizona, Republican lawmakers in a political move, have

crafted one of the most outlandish laws in recent memory. A whole

segment of society, brown-skinned Hispanics and Latinos will become the

The law is a thinly veiled tool of racial profiling, a law based on skin color and ethnicity. The Jim Crow legacy of discrimination and oppression is alive and well in Arizona.

The new law victimizes both Latinos and the police who have to enforce it. It makes a cop judge and jury over fellow citizens who just happen to fit a profile, and, puts all Hispanics and Latinos at the mercy of law-enforcement.

This law is something out of the "dark ages" and is an affront to democracy. Arizona's governor, Jan Brewer, who signed the bill into law, was asked if she knew what an illegal immigrant looked like. She stammered and replied, "no". I rest my case.

Ron Lowe

***

I am responding to Ray Barglow's disagreement with my online Berkeley Planet article which asserts that electromagnetic emissions from cell towers are dangerous to our health and longevity. Ray challenges the studies which claim that these emissions are a public hazard. He believes that they suffer major methodological flaws. Actually, no research on the issue is more flawed than a study that is currently being sponsored by the wireless industry. Incredibly, the industry study excludes certain types of tumors. It even eliminates from the sample those who died or were too sick to answer questions. Ray does note that those whose research he criticizes are not coming to the wrong conclusions because they harbor ulterior motives. But I don't think we could be as generous about those researchers who completely dismiss the issue.

There have been a substantial and growing number of studies, far more than I mentioned in the Planet article, that document the intolerable assault on the health of those who live near cell towers. As a result, over 100 physicians and scientists at Harvard and Boston University Schools of Public Health have agreed that cell towers pose serious risks, whether cell phone users or not. Keep in mind that these scientists are not wild eyed radicals seeking to prey on the business community.

The U.S. standard of radiation exposure from cell sites is among the least protective in the world. The exposure allowed in the U.S. is 580-1,000 microwatts per sq. centimeter, which is 100 to 1,000 times higher than in many countries. Only 10 microwatts are allowed in Russia and Italy, 6 microwatts in China, and only 4 microwatts in Switzerland. I doubt that the widespread fear in Europe and elsewhere that cell site emissions are very dangerous is due to neurotic anxiety.

Obviously, we can have our cell phones without sacrificing our lives for the sake of convenience. But the higher financial costs to business to make these cell sites safer would reduce the rate of profit. Indeed, profit maximization has already given us polluted air and water, food sprayed with poisonous pesticides, and many products that present safety and health hazards. Now for a growing number of people electromagnetic emissions are inescapable. It should not be a surprise that life expectancy in 47 countries is higher than in the United States.

Ray and I have a disagreement about the impact of cell towers, but we agree on a fundamental political principle. Ray is, as always, committed to democracy. I am pleased, but not surprised, that he believes that a community has a right to decide about whether cell sites should be allowed, and if so, under what conditions I couldn't ask for a more worthy opponent.

Harry Brill

***

These banks CEOs should be imprisoned for the repeated frauds and thefts of our banking system since the creation of the Federal Reserve Bank (which should be disbanded and closed) and a new government regulatory agent should disband "the too big to fail" over-sized banks such as Bank of America, Chase, Wells Fargo, Citibank,etc., and corporations like Goldman Sacks who work hand in hand to destroy the American Economy on a daily basis and through out history. Thank you.

Shang-Mei Lee

***

Wall Street and the big banks obviously cannot be trusted to regulate themselves, as some would wish. The country definitely needs sweeping reform of the regulations governing banking and financial practices.

Will Arizona’ s draconian immigration law prompt Congress to act soon on immigration reform? Unlikely. The Democrats have too much on their plate right now -- financial reform, global warming legislation, selecting a Supreme Court nominee, selling health care reform to the public -- to tackle the difficult job of comprehensive immigration reform, including a way for undocumented immigrants to become legal.

For years, a majority of lawmakers in Congress have said the border needs to be secure before they will consider immigration reform. In March, the Department of Homeland Security’s plan to build a virtual fence across the U.S.-Mexico border ended just before the release of a report by a Government Accountability Office report slamming the system. Clearly, virtual fencing or real fencing may slow, but not completely stop, people from trying to cross the border for jobs. The failure of fencing may be used as an excuse not to act.

As I see it, immigration reform is not necessarily a Republican vs. Democrat issue or a conservative vs. liberal issue. Even Latinos are divided with some saying, “we had to work hard to get here, and did it legally,” while others saying, ” it’s okay because everybody does it.” And it is not necessarily a U.S.-Mexico issue either. Many non-Mexican immigrants from Latin America call themselves Mexican; otherwise they would be deported across several borders to their own countries. (Note that Mexico’s immigration policy is more severe than ours, because of the “drug wars” and pressure from the U.S., and its own xenophobia toward other Central American countries.)

Finally, immigration reform is at least tangentially related to the drug problem. U.S. law enforcement officials have identified at least 230 U.S. cities, including Anchorage, Atlanta, and Boston, where Mexican drug cartels or their affiliates maintain drug distribution networks or supply drugs to distributors. And border states like Arizona have suffered a rise in drug-related crime attributed to the Mexican drug cartels. Marijuana is the largest cash crop in the U.S, more valuable than corn and wheat combined, and many of the marijuana plantations run by drug cartels are hidden in our federal and state parklands.

Congress will probably wait at least until Arizona’s law makes its way through the courts and is ultimately ruled unconstitutional, which will take any immigration reform well past mid-term elections.

"The soldiers came early on the morning of Sunday January 4th. [My husband] Atiyeh went to the door with his hands raised holding his ID but they shot him in the doorway," said Zinad. "I shouted 'children, children' in Hebrew but they started shooting," said Zinad's nephew Faraj.

After the massacre, Israeli soldiers left messages for the dead Samounis on the walls of a neighbor's house. The graffiti read: "Arabs need 2 die," "Arabs are pieces of shit," and "1 is DOWN 999,999 TO GO."

What is the student senate's responsibility: to protect the human lives that are stolen by UC-funded war crimes, or to insulate Israel's defenders from the uncomfortable feelings that arise when the truth is told?

Some of the student senators who didn't vote yes have expressed that if today were 1960, they would support a divestment bill related to Jim Crow segregation, because it was clearly a situation of oppression. How many more Palestinian civilians must die at the hands of UC-funded bombs before student senators see this oppression? Or will senators forever sit on their hands because of the tears and emotional outbursts of the defenders of Israel, who cry about their supposed feelings of marginalization even as the UC-backed Israeli military deals out death and destruction to school children?

The divestment bill only targets corporations with clear ties to Israel's war crimes and illegal occupation, such as United Technologies and General Electric. It does not call for divestment from Israel, as Israel's defenders have falsely claimed (including the supposedly liberal, but apparently dishonest, J Street). It sensibly does not take any stance on the final status issues in the Israel/Palestine conflict, such as negotiations over borders. The only thing it does is to send a message to the UC Board of Regents, an undemocratic and unelectedoligarchy, to stop funding illegal activities that harm Palestinian civilians. This bill would also establish a committee to investigate other possible examples of UC-funded war crimes. Many of the UC Regents have personally profited from the military-industrial complex. It's doubtful they'll listen to students - they rarely do - but it is our moral obligation to speak out.

The Palestinian militant group Hamas also committed war crimes, albeit on a smaller scale than Israel's. Fortunately, U.S. law prohibits investments that support Hamas. Thus it is unnecessary to include Hamas in the divestment call.

Israel's defenders point out that the divestment bill does not mention any other human rights violations. But no one said that Berkeley's South Africa Apartheid divestment bill must include Columbia's human rights violations, for example. Each human rights violation is unique, and those who want to target other violations should write and promote such a bill. They will need to establish how University funding contributes to those violations, which requires months of careful research.

Senators, how do you think it feels for us students to know that our tuition dollars are paying to kill our friends, family members, and colleagues in Gaza? Israel should not be entitled to special treatment and a free pass to commit war crimes just because it promotes itself as a Jewish state and certain defenders of Israel can't bring themselves to see the reality of war crimes.

A vote in favor of the divestment bill is a small cry for common sense and ethics in UC investments, and removes the current UC bias toward funding Israel's military. Any other vote will continue the status quo of this University funding yet more war crimes against Palestinian civilians. A yes vote will finally begin the process of justice for Zinad Samouni's 48 dead family members.

Rapid Bus Plus (RB+) is Berkeley's answer to the environmental disaster that is Bus Rapid Transit(BRT). The RB+ Coalition has been working on this plan since AC Transit's Draft EIRs came out and it became clear that the number of new transit riders on BRt would be negligible and the reduction in greenhouse gases with BRT would be miniscule. We believe that RB+ will provide 80% of the projected benefits of BRT for 20% of the cost and virtually none of the detriments. Beyond that, RB+ can be implemented immediately with the current funds AC Transit has on hand. We don't need to wait another 5 years, or longer, for BRT to be fully funded. We need better public transit today!

"Friends of BRT" and TRANSFORM have been frantically trying to rouse supporters of BRT, encouraging people from Oakland and other East Bay cities to come and speak to the Berkeley City Council on Thursday night when a vote on Berkeley's Locally Preferred Alternative will be taken. They are frantic because they've seen their support erode both on the Council and in the audience - of the 52 speakers at last week's Council meeting, fewer than 5 spoke in favor of BRT. They see that a strong turn out by supporters of Rapid Bus Plus could tip the scales for an environmentally friendly solution to AC Transits problems.

If you believe that there must be a better solution to Berkeley's public transit problems than dedicating 2 lanes of traffic from the Oakland border to downtown Berkeley so a bus can use the lane every 7 1/2 minutes, then I urge you to come on Thursday night and stand with the Rapid Bus Plus Coalition. We have the opportunity to make Rapid Bus Plus Berkeley's only Locally Preferred Alternative and say goodbye to dedicated lanes once and for all.

We know Rapid Bus plus is Berkeley's locally preferred alternative because its been endorsed by many of the southside neighborhoods and at all of the neighborhood and stakeholder meetings that were held last summer and fall. Not a single one of the meetings had a majority in favor of BRT and most had overwhelming opposition to BRT.

5) Rapid Bus Plus means we build as little as possible – no dedicated lanes or massive stations in the middle of Telegraph Ave. and other major arterials.

6) Rapid Bus Plus provides level or near-level boarding at curbside.

The Rapid Bus Plus Coalition has worked with Berkeley's Transportation Dept. staff and with the Cambridge Systematics consultants to develop a transit proposal that meets Berkeley's needs and is buildable for a fraction of the cost of BRT. The Planners made sure that the elements of Rapid Bus Plus were ready to be tested. Don't be fooled by those who say that Rapid Bus Plus is not a real system - take the word of the planners who know better.

Come to the Council meeting this Thursday night at 7pm. The vote on the Locally Preferred Alternative is the only thing on the agenda. Make sure your councilperson knows what you want Berkeley's public transit to look like.

Ending corporate dominance of our government is key to most of what we want whether climate justice, fair trade, food security, affordable quality healthcare, or -- in many cases -- peace. The "CITIZENS UNITED" Supreme Court ruling against the Federal Elections Commission lifted corporate limits on buying elections, so Berkeley's Peace & Justice Commission recommends that the City Council again call for constitutional amendments saying that a corporation is not a person and may not claim constitutional "rights" (such as corporate financing of election ads being defined as free speech.) These resolutions are researched/vetted by volunteer commissioners, cost the city almost nothing, and have more weight than individual lobbying. Corporations may operate by privilege, the way they did historically, and can more easily be held accountable, when needed, if they no longer have human rights.

If this makes sense to you, PLEASE ask the Berkeley Mayor and City Council to vote for this Resolution now via email or phone: clerk@CityofBerkeley.info

Your note will be more persuasive if you personalize it by telling them a bit about yourself or why you care about saving democracy and whether you live or work in Berkeley.

Emails may be addressed to: Honorable Mayor Bates and members of the Berkeley City Council.

They will vote on it at the Tues April 27 meeting tomorrow which starts at 7pm, Maudelle Shirek City Hall, MLK Jr Way between Allston/Center. It is item #13 on the consent calendar. People are bringing small signs to hold up with bold and concise messages such as:

$ = Speech?!

Corporations =?!

End Corporate Personhood!

End Rule Inc.!

Save Democracy!

YES 28th Amendment!

If they do not pass it by unanimous consent at the beginning of the meeting (with 2 minutes each for 3 speakers), public comment will be allowed just before it comes up for Council discussion later that night, sometime before 11pm. Public comment rules, which are complex, can be found here. (Scroll down to find them.)

President Obama, “a major victory for big oil, Wall Street banks, health insurance companies and the other powerful interests that marshal their power every day in Washington to drown out the voices of everyday Americans.” nytimes

John Kerry “...the Court has struck at the very heart of our democracy, a democracy in which corporations already have too much influence....the system has now been tilted inexorably towards those who have the most money... also clears the way for the domestic subsidiaries of foreign corporations to spend unlimited amounts of money to influence our elections..." http://kerry.senate.gov/cfm/record.cfm?id=322006

Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Patrick Leahy "goes to the very core of our democracy and it will allow major corporations -- who should have law written to control their effect on America -- instead control America."

Former Senator Warren Rudman (R-NH), "Supreme Court opinion notwithstanding, corporations are not defined as people under the Constitution, and free speech can hardly be called free when only the rich are heard."

WHEREAS, Chapter 3.68 of the Berkeley Municipal Code sets forth functions of the Peace and Justice Commission including,"(A) Advise the Berkeley City Council on all matters relating to the City of Berkeley's role in issues of peace and social justice, including, but not limited to support for human rights and self-determination throughout the world;" and

WHEREAS, on June 15, 2004 the Berkeley City Council unanimously passed a Resolution on Corporate Constitutional Rights stating, in part, that "historically corporations were created as artificial entities, chartered by state governments to serve the public interest, cause no harm, and be subordinate to the sovereign people; and yet by judicial interpretations, corporations gained personhood status, free speech and other protections guaranteed by the Bill of Rights and the 14th Amendment," although the framers had no such intention, and that "the citizens of the City of Berkeley consider it to be our sovereign right and civic duty to recognize that corporations remain artificial entities created by the people through our state legislatures;" and

WHEREAS, the U.S. Supreme Court 5:4 ruling on January 21, 2010 (in Citizens United v. the Federal Election Commission) rolled back remaining legal limits on corporate spending in the electoral process, allowing unlimited corporate spending to influence elections, candidate selection, and policy decisions and thus potentially unleashing unprecedented torrents of corporate money in our political process thereby drowning out the voices of "We the People" and threatening democracy.

NOW THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED that the Council of the City of Berkeley again calls for amending the United States and California Constitutions to declare that corporations are not entitled to the protections or "rights" of human beings and to declare that the expenditure of corporate money is not a form of constitutionally protected speech.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the Council of the City of Berkeley applauds Congresswoman Donna Edwards for promptly introducing a related amendment to the U.S. Constitution (H.J.RES. 74) and thanks Congresswoman Barbara Lee for co-sponsoring it.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the Council of the City of Berkeley calls on other communities and jurisdictions to join this action by passing similar Resolutions.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the City Council directs the City Manager to send copies of this Resolution to our state and federal government representatives including: Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, CA State Assemblymember Nancy Skinner, CA State Senator Loni Hancock, Majority Leader of the CA State Assembly Karen Bass [now Alberto Torrico,] President pro tempore of the CA State Senate Darrell Steinberg, U.S. Representative Barbara Lee, U.S. Senators Barbara Boxer and Dianne Feinstein, Majority Leader of the U.S. House of Representatives Steny Hoyer, Majority Leader of the U.S. Senate Harry Reid, and President Barak Obama.

Current situation and its effects

On January 21, 2010, the Supreme Court of the United States in Citizens United v. the Federal Election Commission reversedlong-established constitutional law by extending first amendment and other constitutional "rights" to corporations, specifically in regard to holding that corporate campaign spending is "protected speech." In reaction to this unprecedented decision, a Joint Resolution was introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives calling for an amendment to the U.S. Constitution that would partially reverse the Citizens United decision by permitting Congress to regulate corporate expenditures in elections. (House Joint Resolution 74).

Rationale for recommendation

The Peace and Justice Commission, consistent with its mandate to promote peace and justice, locally, nationally and internationally, views the recent U.S. Supreme Court decision in Citizens United v. the Federal Election Commission to be a direct threat to democracy as it promotes increasing corporate influence in a government "of, by and for the people." The City Manager takes no position on the Commission's recommendations contained in this Report.

In a stunning victory for environmental groups, the California Court of Appeal rejected most of Chevron’s challenge to a lower court decision that stopped construction on a $1 billion refinery upgrade.

The decision is a vindication for those of us on the City Council who maintained that the EIR was deficient and voted not to certify it. In my case, that vote was not a vote against the project; it was a vote against a flawed process that eventually led to shutting down construction at a great loss of jobs.

Had we been listened to, the EIR could have been repaired, the project approved, and presumably well under construction by now. In what is counter-intuitive for a lot of people, we who opposed the EIR certification are being blamed for shutting the project down. In fact, just the opposite is true. Those who wanted to proceed with a flawed EIR bear that responsibility. They include the City Council majority, the construction trades unions and Chevron, to name the most important.

The ball is in Chevron’s court. They could appeal to the Supreme Court, but legal experts generally agree that would be fruitless. They could ask the City to repair the EIR along with appropriate mitigations and move the project forward. Or they could do nothing. There is some indication that Chevron has lost interest in the project and would rather just let it die while continuing to blame others. We’ll see.

Berkeley -- During July 1944, when famed Lieutenant C.D. "Lucky" Lester of the Tuskegee Airmen shot down 3 Nazi enemy aircraft over Europe in a brief span of 4-6 minutes with his P-51 Mustang while on a mission to protect some B-17 Flying Fortresses on their way to bomb a German airfield in southern Germany, he probably had no idea then that his actions would lead to the day he became one of the founders in 1969 of a small venture capital firm called the Inner City Fund, that was later renamed ICF International. It now plays a direct role in the scheme of some high priced consultants who desire to grab Section 8 funding from the poor, to finance their master plan to privatize Berkeley's 75 public housing units.

On Friday April 23, ICF International's (ICFi) vice president (consultant) Carole Norris from the multi-national's corporate San Francisco office, could be found at the North Berkeley Senior Center promoting the termination of Berkeley's public housing program by way of Agenda Items A & B of the Action Calendar, from her lofty position as the Chair of the Berkeley Housing Authority (BHA), along with highly paid consultants Erik Novak and Scott Jepsen of EJP/Praxis Consulting Groups, including Jon Gresley, executive director of one of a few (33) controversial experimental MTW - Public Housing Authorities (MTW-PHAs), that do not have to abide by the normal federal laws protecting federally subsidized low-income renters/clients in the nation’s over 3,000 public housing authorities.

This is the same Jon Gresley that was involved in the controversy over the notorious one strike policy, when his agency moved to evict 4 innocent elderly public housing residents of Oakland, for alleged crimes they did not commit, resulting in a huge struggle that was fought all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court by Anne Omura of the Eviction Defense Center, and a team of 26 local attorneys defending the rights of Oakland's public housing residents in 2002.

The April 23 vote to pass the agenda items was part of a series of votes being orchestrated by the corporate consultants that have infiltrated the BHA, in their crusade to dismantle the BHA's public housing program, in an effort to privatize Berkeley's 75 public housing units.

Berkeley's public housing tenant Keith Carlisle had the support of other low-income public housing residents who allowed him to speak on their behalf at the April 23, BHA meeting, even though he was cut short by the BHA's commissioners while doing his best at the meeting to speak-out against the scheme to terminate Berkeley's public housing program, in the struggle against the high priced consultants from ICF International, EJP Consulting Group, Praxis Consulting, and Overland, Pacific and Cutler consultants that have infiltrated the BHA.

In addition, Janny Castillo, Community Builder, with Building Opportunities for Self-Sufficiency (BOSS), was also at the meeting to offer support to the mostly African-American low-income households trying to save Berkeley's public housing from being privatized.

Currently, public housing is home to around 3 million seniors, people with disabilities, and low-income families, and plays an essential role to provide services for the elderly poor and others -- while contributing significantly to local economies by the direct spending of $8.1 billion a year by PHAs on capital improvements, maintenance, and operations of their public housing projects, while generating an additional $8.2 billion in direct economic activity throughout the nation's communities (See 2007 PHA economic study - Joint Release from CLPHA, HAI Group, PHADA).

In a July 2009 BHA report, EJP consultants claim that $3,608,693 is needed in hard costs to repair Berkeley's public housing units, and that Berkeley's public housing program is operating at a loss of $106,000 per year. However, contradicting those figures, in an October 2009 BHA release by ICFi / BHA chair Norris and BHA Executive Director Tia Ingram, they offer different figures stating that the BHA needs over $4.5 million in hard cost repairs for its public housing units, and that Berkeley's public housing program is operating at a loss of $150,000 per year. Around a million dollar difference, in conflicting numbers.

Based on the information in the same July 2009, BHA consultants report, 86.5% of the residents in the BHA's public housing program identify themselves as Black / African-American, 11.2 % as white, and 2.2% as Asian.

The disposition plan (application DDA0003874) to terminate Berkeley's public housing program, was filed by the BHA in late December 2009, is currently under review by Arona Wiley, and the BHA has been expecting the Housing and Urban Development Agency (HUD) to approve the plan to terminate Berkeley's public housing program sometime in April, 2010, but that approval by HUD may not materialize until sometime in June, or later.

Despite the bleak outcome of the BHA's April 23, commission meeting that again voted to dispose of Berkeley's public housing units, some of Berkeley's low-income public housing residents believe that they have won a victory, because the consultants convinced them that they may have up to a year, before being displaced from their long-time homes in the Berkeley community.

Lynda Carson may be reached at tenantsrule@yahoo.com

Columns

The latest polls indicate that if the mid-term elections were held today, Democrats would lose seats in Congress because of dissatisfaction about the economy, particularly high rates of unemployment. Over the next six months, what should the Obama Administration do to solve the jobs problem?

For several months, the unemployment rate has lingered around ten percent. Sadly, the last report noted, “44.1 percent of unemployed persons were jobless for 27 weeks or more.” In addition to 15 million unemployed there are 9.1 million “involuntary part-time workers” plus another 1 million “discouraged workers, who have given up looking; in other words, 1 out of every six US workers that wants a full-time job does not have one.

While most voters blame former President Bush for the collapse of the economy, President Obama has borne the brunt of anger over unemployment. Fortunately, there are many indications the economy is getting better. The GDP forecast is positive for the first quarter and the year. And widely watched economic indicators such as the Bloomberg Personal Finance Index and the TED spread are positive. But it’s unclear how quickly employment will follow.

Recently, Vice President Biden predicted accelerated job growth, “Some time in the next couple of months we’re going to be creating between 250,000 jobs a month and 500,000 jobs a month.” And there are several indications of improving employment conditions. If true, this will indicate the US economy is beginning a U shaped recovery rather than the dreaded “inverted L” shape – a rapid descent following by a painfully slow employment rebound.

President Obama’s January 27th State of the Union address emphasized job creation: “jobs must be our number-one focus in 2010, and that's why I'm calling for a new jobs bill tonight.” “I'm proposing that we take $30 billion of the money Wall Street banks have repaid and use it to help community banks give small businesses the credit they need to stay afloat… I'm also proposing a new small business tax credit -– one that will go to over one million small businesses who hire new workers or raise wages… While we're at it, let's also eliminate all capital gains taxes on small business investment, and provide a tax incentive for all large businesses and all small businesses to invest in new plants and equipment…”

A recent SBA report observed, “Over the past 15 years, small businesses have accounted for about 65 percent of the private-sector net job creation.” 64 percent of the jobs lost in 2008 were due to cuts at small firms.

Early in February, the White House gave Congress small-business-oriented job-creation initiatives. On February 26th, a House committee considered the $30 Billion community-bank proposal. Unfortunately, Republicans painted it as another “bail-out,” claiming lenders aren’t lending because they “are uncertain about the changing regulatory environment." Since then the proposal has languished in Congress. (Although, on April 16th, the Small Business Administration got an $80 million extension of its popular small business loan program.) In his April 27th town-hall Meeting in Ottumwa, Iowa President Obama said, “One of our proposals is to have some of [the repaid bailout] money used to help get small business loans out… this is really a top priority for our administration.”

On April 18th, President Obama signed a $38 billion jobs bill with multiple job-creation provisions: “businesses that hire anyone who has been out of work for at least 60 days would be exempt from paying the 6.2% Social Security payroll tax on that employee through December… Employers would get an additional $1,000 credit for each new worker remaining on the job for a full year.”

In his 2011 budget the President proposed to eliminate capital gains taxes for small businesses under common-sense conditions.

There’s divided opinion about whether additional Federal action is necessary. While most observers believe a “credit crunch” is inhibiting banks from the small business lending essential for robust job-creation, some feel the general market recovery will resolve this problem. Writing in a recent KIPLINGER LETTER, economist Richard DeKaser predicts the end of the credit crunch: “Business access to bank loans is poised to improve as lenders get losses under control and upgrade their economic outlook.”

Other observers disagree. They believe the Federal Government needs to pass a massive jobs bill. Economist Robert Reich calls for “At least another $300 billion in stimulus money... Some should go to the states and cities to restore cuts; some should be applied to the nation's crumbling infrastructure; a portion should go to direct hiring (a new WPA).”

At this writing, it appears that the Obama Administration is about to score an impressive victory with the passage of meaningful financial reform. To solve the jobs problem the White House should seize on this momentum and cajole Congress to pass the $30 Billion community-bank initiative.

So what does being stranded in the middle of the high Mexican desert have to do with Chrysler and cocaine? Well, it was a Chrysler that got Anne and me into the mess—a model aptly named Attitude (“all attitude,” as one of my kids would say). But there was no cocaine or other assorted drugs in the tiny town of Bondojito Huichapan Hidalgo, just a hardware store, a minuscule tienda, and, of course, a church.

For most Americans, however, Mexico is all about drugs and violence, and it is hard not to think about our southern neighbor without conjuring up the vocabulary of the Apocalypse: “With deadly Persistence, Mexican Drug Cartels Get Their Way” screams the New York Times; “Mexico’s drug war stirs fear in the U.S.” warns the San Francisco Chronicle; “Obama eyes troops for Mexico drug war,” headlines the Financial Times. Since 2006, according to Aljazeera, 22,743 people have been victims of the conflict, vastly more than the U.S. and its allies have lost in the Iraq and Afghan wars.

So if you are a couple of Gringos dead in the water in the middle of nowhere these things come into your mind, particularly when the tow truck has not arrived and it’s starting to get dark.

But as I said, we didn’t encounter any drugs or gangs, just helpful locals (I think somewhat bemused by our situation), a friendly tow truck driver, a solicitous guy from Hertz, a difficult taxi driver, and a very sympathetic hotel staff. In fact, the whole time we were in Mexico we didn’t see a shoot out or any bodies, although the journalist we were staying with—Martha Mendoza, one of Associated Press’s aces—told us about a recent gunfight in Monterrey.

Martha is currently writing about the status of the “war on drugs” that Richard Nixon declared back in 1971, and that governments all over Latin America are starting to abandon. As wars go, it has been an unmitigated calamity.

“How much misery can a policy cause before it is acknowledged as a failure and reversed? The U.S. ‘war on drugs’ suggests there is no upper limit,” writes Financial Times columnist Clive Crook. “The country’s implacable blend of prohibition and punitive criminal justice is wrong headed in every way: immoral in principle, since it prosecutes victimless crimes, and in practice a disaster of remarkable proportions.”

A recent report by the 17-member Latin American Commission on Drugs and Democracy, lead by three former heads of state, concluded, according to Wall Street Journal columnist Jose de Cordoba, that “US-style anti-drug strategy was putting the region’s fragile democratic institutions at risk and corrupting ‘judicial systems, governments, the political system and especially the police force.”

It has also had virtually no effect on the movement of drugs. According to a Guardian (UK) investigation, more than 750 tons of cocaine is shipped from the Andes, a traffic that “has forced peasants off land, trigged gang wars and perverted state institutions.” As Col. Rene Sanabria, the head of Bolivia’s anti-narcotic police force, told the British newspaper, “The strategy of the U.S. here, in Colombia and Peru was to attack the raw material and it has not worked.”

In the case of Colombia, the U.S. has poured $6 billion in mostly military aid into the country, plus poisoning almost 2.5 million acres of coca plants. Coco production is up by 16 percent.

Member of the commission and former Brazilian President Fernando Henrique Cardoso said, “The available evidence indicates that the war on drugs is a failed war. We have to move from this approach to another,” and urged a rejection of the “U.S. prohibitionist policies.”

A study by the Brookings Institute agrees, as does a study by Harvard economist Jeffrey Miron and endorsed by 500 economists.

The Commission report has received widespread coverage in Latin America. “They’re saying enough is enough,” says John Walsh of the Andes and Drug Policy at the Washington Office on Latin America. “There’s a real drug war weariness in Latin America and its bad enough to feel like a policy had been imposed and its worse when the policy doesn’t work.”

Mexico, for instance, has deployed an estimated 35,000 soldiers in 14 states, only to see drug-related deaths increase, and more and more municipalities fall under the influence of drug cartels.

There is also growing anger that the body count in Mexico is a direct result of U.S. weapons dealers selling everything from automatic weapons and 50-caliber sniper rifles, to grenades and rocket launchers to south of the border gangs. According to a Congressional study, more than 90 percent of the guns used by Mexican drug gangs come from dealers in Arizona, New Mexico and Texas.

In Arizona last year, the state appellate court dismissed a case against a gun dealer who had sold some 700 weapons to intermediaries for Mexican drug gang smugglers. Several of the guns were used to kill eight police officers in Culiacan, the capital of Sinaloa state. It is estimated that this southbound flow of firepower generates about $25 billion a year for U.S. gun dealers.

The “collateral” damage from the “war on drugs” is not just to Mexico and the rest of Latin America. According to Miron’s study, more than 500,000 people are in prison for drug crimes in the U.S.—the overwhelming percentage of them for possession—more than the total number of prisoners for all crimes in Great Britain, Germany, Spain, France and Italy combined.

Changing those laws, however, will require coming up against a powerful coalition of law enforcement agencies and the prison industry that cost taxpayers about $100 billion a year.

A number of Latin American countries have begun pulling away from the U.S. approach. Last summer, Mexico eliminated jail time for small amounts of marijuana, cocaine, heroin, LSD and methamphetamine. Brazil, Colombia and Uruguay have also decriminalized possession of drugs for personal use, and Argentina’s Supreme Court ruled that criminalization of marijuana possession was unconstitutional.

Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa pardoned some 2000 small-time drug couriers last year, telling the parliament, “They are single mothers or unemployed people who are desperate to feed their families.”

The model everyone seems to be looking at these days is Portugal, which eliminated jail time for personal drug possession. A recent study on the decriminalization of drugs in that county found “While many drug addiction, usage, and associated pathologies continue to skyrocket in many European Union states, those problems—in virtually every relevant category—have been either contained or measurable improved with Portugal since 2001.”

The Netherlands and Switzerland have also decriminalized possession.

The Obama administration has taken a few tentative steps in the direction of redirecting the “war on drugs,” including lifting the ban on federal funding of needle exchange programs, and shifting some Latin American aid from the military to civilian law enforcement. But criminalization is still at the heart of the U.S. approach.

A decade ago, the U.S. pressed the United Nations to adopt a “drug-free world” strategy, rather than focusing on addiction and treatment. The results have been a disaster. A European commission on the UN strategy concluded last year that this is “no evidence that the global drug problem was reduced” in the past 10 years, and “while the situation has improved in some of the richer countries…for others it has worsened, and for some it worsened sharply and substantially.”

Kasia Malinowska-Sempruch, director of the global drug policy program at the Open Society Institute in Warsaw told the Guardian, “Thanks to the global ‘war on drugs’ over the past decade, close to two million people living in the former Soviet Union are infected with HIV, half a million U.S. citizens languish in prison for non-violent, drug related crimes, and billions of dollars are spent on destructive military actions in Colombia while the production of cocaine continues to rise.”

There is no question that the war on drugs makes parts of Mexico and Latin America dangerous. But the majority of people in those countries go through their lives having nothing to do with drug gangs or shootouts. Indeed, the thing that strikes one most about Mexicans—besides their politeness and sense of humor—is their common sense. No, you don’t have to take off your shoes to get on an airplane, and when your artificial hip sets off the alarm bells, they don’t take 20 minutes to go over every inch of your body with metal detectors.

So while being marooned in the desert with a badly designed Chrysler is not a lot of fun, it eventually sorts itself out. Our misguided “war on drugs” will be a steeper hill to climb.

Eighty-three year old Lawrance J. Phillips rents a “studio” in a Berkeley Section 8 project. (HUD subsidizes low-income seniors’ and disabled persons’ rents via the Section 8 program.) Born and raised in Iowa, Larry had a year of college. He feels secure in the streets of his community “most of the time.”

His hearing and eyesight “could be better,” and he takes several prescription meds and uses the Veterans Administration health service. Larry serves on the North Berkeley Senior Center Advisory Council. He would like to see trips scheduled by the Center to the new Catholic Cathedral in Oakland, the Fox Theater and whale watching, also an Italian class.

Asked, whether he has ever attended a Berkeley Commission on Aging meeting, Larry replies, “No, what do they do?” He is a member of the Peace and Freedom Party. Before retirement, he worked for an insurance company. He uses the central public library. Avatar was “too juvenile for me!” History is his preferred subject, currently reading R.R.Tolkien’s The Legend of Sigurd and Gudrun.

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Berkeley resident Ying Lee has been a Kaiser patient for many years. She has an advance health care directive. She does not attend senior centers, uses the YMCA gym. When asked if she smokes, her response suggested that she once did but “gave it up.” She takes one prescription med and never took estrogen. She experienced a recent fracture, and has begun calcium and Vitamin D. Her main health problems are “hearing, fading eyesight and arthritic fingers.” Two years ago she fainted twice while driving. Now without car, she uses buses but not taxi scrip.

Seventy-eight year old Ying Lee is a former member of the Berkeley Public Library board of trustees, although she borrows books from the University library. Her family consists of 2 children and a grandchild. Before retirement 10 years ago, she was employed as Barbara Lee’s legislative director. When asked about current volunteer work, she mentioned her concern for “peace and social justice issues”.

Ying Lee’s favorite TV programs are Bill Moyer, Frontline, Nova, POV, Boston Legal, and Justice. [“Justice: What's The Right Thing to Do?” is on PBS KRCB Channel 22, taught by Harvard Professor Michael Sandel. Euthanasia is among the “issues” he considers. The entire series is available on the web.]

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Avis Worthington is a well known Gray Panther; she edits and writes the Berkeley chapter’s newsletter. She is 78 years old and has been “going to Kaiser” for 30 years, with “a little time off when…got divorced.” Yes, she has an advance health care directive. Her main problem is eyesight— macular degeneration, with cataract surgery in the offing. Still, she identified arthritis as her main health problem. When I asked about what she would do if she were alone and fell, she acknowledged that would be a problem. She recognizes the considerable difference between a rental that is ‘low income housing’ and one that is considered “affordable housing.”

She’s from Wisconsin. Earned her B.A. degree in art history at the University of Illinois and M.A. in writing at San Francisco State. Avis drives her own car, but does not have a disabled person’s placard. My question prompted her intention to look into it! [It’s free. The application form is at http://www.dmv.ca.gov/forms/reg/reg195.pdf ]

Not surprising that she uses a Mac-- pre-retirement she was a writer. She attends the North Berkeley Senior Center and is an AARP and Wellstone Democrats member. She doesn’t use the public library, preferring to buy books and donate them. Her favorite TV programs are Monk and CSpan.

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Through thick and thin, 83-year old Jocelyn Ferguson is ready, willing and able, although getting her to discuss herself wasn’t easy. Joy was born in Trinidad and has completed university-level education. Before retirement, she was employed as a travel agent. When asked how ‘your’ senior center may have changed, her response was so Joy: “It offers a wide selection of Trips, Classes and Programs. There have been some changes with New Management, but this is bound to happen – there are changes every day in normal living, and we must be able to go with the flow.”

For years, Joy has been caring for the flower beds in front of the North Berkeley Senior Center as well as tending her personal Strawberry Creek Lodge garden patch. She innovated, and is responsible for, the Center’s Friday after-lunch opera video series. She is a Gray Panther who prefers mystery novels -- currently reading Lynda LaPlante’s Above Suspicion -- and publications about opera. Movies that are “oldies,” like Turner Classics, appeal to her. She enjoys Hallmark and BBC Chanel 4 News. She has a pc and email.

Not as “active as I used to be, and don’t attend many meetings anymore.”

Joy’s main health problems are hypertension and asthma (she does not smoke). Hearing and eyesight are both good; arthritis is treated with aspirin and Icy Hot. She uses the Over 60 Health Center and does not have a power of attorney or advance health care directive. She is “not sure” of the difference between a nursing home and assisted living and was unaware of the Elmwood Nursing Home scandal in the news in March.

Lucky Joy’s response is “Don’t have one,” when asked what is or has been her main housing problem, and she feels secure in her community. She lives alone in a Section 8 unit, and has family nearby. She screens incoming phone calls “most of the time.” Asked about her main transportation problem, again: “Don’t have one.” Joy manages her transportation with a formulation of automobile, taxi scrip, and bus.

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For your consideration:

If you are eligible for a Disabled Person Placard, note that “When parking, hang the placard from the rear view mirror. REMOVE IT WHEN DRIVING.”

CALL TO CONFIRM these May 2010 meetings of interest to senior citizens:

Kaua’i is an extraordinary place to see seabirds. Kilauea National Wildlife Refuge on the North Shore hosts nesting Laysan albatrosses, red-footed boobies, and wedge-tailed shearwaters. The boobies occupy a wooded slope above the ocean; we watched them bringing in twigs as nesting material. The albatrosses, mostly unpaired adolescents and supersized chicks, use a nearby hill. Almost literally underfoot, the shearwaters had excavated burrows right at the edge of a paved path. Great frigatebirds, long-winged piratical creatures, nest elsewhere but come to Kilauea to steal fish from the hapless boobies.

With all that, I’d have to say that our most memorable seabird encounters involved tropicbirds. Two species breed in the Hawai’ian Islands, the white-tailed (koa’e kea in Hawai’ian) and the red-tailed (koa’e ‘ula). Tropicbirds are sleek, long-winged birds, somewhat like terns in appearance except for the pair of elongated feathers that extend from their tails. As you would expect, these streamers are red in the red-tailed tropicbird and usually white in the white-tailed, although we saw one individual white-tail with salmon-pink streamers. The red-tail’s feathers were used in traditional Hawai’ian regalia.

Although we saw red-tails only at Kilauea, we ran into at least a white-tailed tropicbird or two almost every day: in Waimea Canyon, near Poi’pu on the South Shore, at Wailua and ‘Opaeka’a falls on the east side. We watched them gliding above W. S. Merwin’s folding cliffs in the Kalalau Valley, in and out of the constantly moving fog. When a stray sunbeam hit them, their white plumage lit up.

Tropicbirds have traditionally been assigned to the order of birds that includes pelicans, cormorants, anhingas, gannets, boobies, and frigatebirds, with which they share totipalmate feet: all four toes connected by webbing. But a major phylogenetic study in 2008 grouped them in a lineage that included pigeons and doves, sandgrouse, grebes, and flamingos. Their fossil record is sparse, although 50-million-year-old remains in England have been attributed to a tropicbird or close relative.

Superbly adapted for flight, tropicbirds have small, weak legs and feet that are barely adequate for terra firma. “When they move short distances, they shuffle forward by pushing with both feet and falling forward on their bellies,” writes Craig Harrison in Seabirds of Hawaii: Natural History and Conservation. They don’t swim well either. But in flight they’re grace incarnate, turning and twisting to capture flyingfish, squid, mackerel scad, and sauries, or to evade a pursuing frigatebird. Red-tailed tropicbirds can pick off flyingfish on the wing.

Tropicbird courtship is aerobatic. We did not get to see the courtship flight of the white-tailed tropicbird, in which a pair glides in tandem, the male’s tail streamers touching the female’s back. However, we caught the red-tails’ performance at the Kilauea refuge: a half-dozen birds facing into the wind and back-pedaling so as to leapfrog their neighbors. This is accompanied by the strident vocalizations that led sailors to call them bosun birds, for the sound of the boatswain’s whistle.

The two species have different nesting habitat preferences. Red-tails lay their single egg under concealing vegetation on flat clifftops overlooking the sea. White-tails use crevices in inland canyons, often near waterfalls. Twice we watched a white-tail spiral down toward a cliff face and suddenly disappear into an undetectable cavity in the rock wall. These birds also nest on the rims of the still-active craters of the other Kilauea on the Big Island, about as predator-proof a site as you can imagine.

Both sexes incubate the single egg. Depending on site availability, red-tails can be loosely colonial, but they are far from neighborly.

A cultural sidebar: the annual Merrie Monarch hula competition took place at Hilo on the Big Island while we were on Kaua’i. (The monarch in question: King David Kalakaua, who helped rehabilitate the hula after its suppression by missionaries.) The winning group this year, Ke Kai O Kahiki, performed a tropicbird-inspired routine including a jumping move called kenapulu that evoked the birds’ diving maneuvers. You can see it on YouTube.

They did not, however, try to imitate the backward-circling dance of the red-tailed tropicbird. That’s something I would happily pay to see.

Spring showers will give way to local, native, wildflowers this weekend as a number of local homeowners invite the public into their gardens.

This Sunday is the 6th Annual Bringing Back the Natives Garden Tour, featuring several Berkeley and Berkeley-area gardens.

The focus of the free tour is, as the name implies, growing California native species in the home garden. The gardens typically range from those of native purists—who don’t water, and exclude all introduced species—to gardens where native and drought-tolerant species predominate but also harmonize with other plantings.

Some are designed by professionals, others homemade and homegrown. They range from a few hundred square feet in the flatlands to extensive and complex properties in the Berkeley hills.

Berkeley sites include the Fleming Garden on Shasta Road, where the owners began gardening with natives in the 1950s and have created a spectacular hillside native enclave above an artificial stream, and swimming pool.

The tour brochure describes it as “the leading native plant garden in private ownership in California” and, having visited before, I can tell you it’s a sight to see. There’s a front yard grove of native trees with a shady wall covered with native ferns; around the back of the house a switchback path climbs an artfully gardened slope into the sun and Bay views.

The garden of Glen Schneider on California Street is also a tour regular. It’s intended to be “reminiscent of what the Berkeley flats might have looked like prior to the arrival of Europeans” and is planted with only native species gathered by seed or cutting within three miles of the garden.

There are 12 gardens open in Berkeley, Albany, El Cerrito, and the southern tip of Richmond for this tour, and several in Oakland and Alameda, plus others further afield over the hills, from Pinole to Livermore to Martinez and Moraga. Four of the Berkeley gardens are listed as new to the tour since last year.

A number of public gardens, school gardens, research gardens, and native plant nurseries will also be featured on the tour. They include the ever-fascinating California Native Bee Garden (on the University of California’s Oxford Tract, just northwest of the campus), the Alameda Butterfly Habitat in a schoolyard, and the Native Here Nursery in Berkeley.

Native Here—at 101 Gold Course Links Road in Tilden Park—will also be open on Saturday for special sales. East Bay Wilds nursery in Berkeley will be selling plants on Sunday.

The tour runs from 10 am to 5 pm on Sunday, May 2. Children are allowed but must be “closely supervised”. Pets are not allowed.

It’s too late to order a tour brochure on line, but you can register in person on the morning of the tour and pick one up. You need a brochure to get the tour maps, detailed printed garden descriptions and locations, and tear-out tokens for admission.

The gardens are also extensively described, with some pictures, on the Bringing Back the Natives website, so you can take a look in advance for the ones that might be of most interest.

The Berkeley “walk-in” registration site is 1344 Carlotta Street—which is also one of the open gardens. But don’t go there before 10 am on Sunday. The website also lists nine other scattered registration gardens.

The tour is free—funded by government agency and private grants and donations--but this year the organizers have included a prominent appeal in the brochure asking attendees to consider voluntarily donating $10 minimum per person (for the whole tour, not each garden). There will be donation jars at the open gardens.

Note: this tour always seems to conflict with the annual Berkeley Architectural Heritage Association (BAHA) House Tour which this year also takes place on Sunday the 2nd. I’m going to the House Tour which is in the afternoon and features nine spectacular Julia Morgan homes. However, I’ve learned from experience of past years that it’s possible to visit at least two or three of the local native gardens starting at 10:00 am and still get to the BAHA Tour in plenty of time. Both events can be enjoyed.

Steven Finacom is on the Board of the Berkeley Architectural Heritage Association, and has written for the Planet about numerous community, garden, and historic events.)

“Senior citizen population on brink of explosion in world and in United States” declares Senior Journal, quoting the U.S. Census Bureau. It would indeed seem that we are old enough to make a difference, and not just at election time.

Ten years ago I interviewed several North Berkeley Senior Center elders regarding voting, an upcoming election, and low-income housing. The following year, I reported their views on the right to die. (Berkeley Daily Planet: “Old enough to make a difference,” Nov. 1, 2000; “Seniors could lose Section 8 housing help,” December 26, 2000; “Seniors hesitate to talk about assisted suicide,” Feb. 26, 2001.)

From those interviews, I drew several general conclusions:

• Seniors often lack information needed to make informed decisions;

• Many seniors who consider themselves “informed” have not taken a proactive approach to ensuring that their wishes are carried out;

• Deficient care at the end of life is due in part to health care providers’ failure to implement patients’ wishes and to provide adequate palliatives.

During March and April 2010 I asked a diverse group of senior citizens about their concerns and preferences. Now we are focusing on the 3 big influences on old Americans’ well-being: health, housing and transportation.

The typical responder uses Kaiser, two use Over 60, and one, the Veterans Administration. None has a free “My Medicare” account. (See March 25 SENIOR POWER). None currently smokes; 1 acknowledges drinking. All take 1 or more prescription meds. Several take glucosamine chondroitin sulfate. Arthritis is a problem.

Two occupy HUD, rent-subsidized, Section 8 units. None lives in public housing. Most live alone. Four own their residence. Of those who are eligible, 1 receives Berkeley taxi scrip; the others inexplicably have not applied for it or have ceased using it. Most use buses. Four have cars; 2 have disabled placards. [For information about Berkeley Paratransit free taxi scrip, email housing@cityofberkeley.info or phone (510) 981-5400.]

All are registered voters. Most have personal computers and use a public library. None of the Berkeley residents has attended a Commission on Aging meeting; most are unaware of its existence. Several feel insecure where they live and in the streets of their community, although none screens incoming phone calls.

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“I haven’t changed…” Nisei Aiko Yamamoto declared adamantly, referring to views expressed a decade ago. A positive and active person, Aiko considers herself ‘liberal’ because she believes in the right to die and in abortion. Now 89, this strong woman continues to endorse physician-assisted suicide, although she is not confident that physicians can be counted on. Her family has been decimated by cancer. Aiko underwent colon cancer, and she has had no recurrence. She has been “satisfied” with Kaiser since 1952, wears glasses, reports “great” hearing, takes one prescription med, and has an advance health care directive.

Aiko is looking forward to Trader Joe in Berkeley. She volunteers at the North Berkeley Senior Center front desk and served one term on the Center’s Advisory Council. “One was enough!!” The Jewish Center’s exercise class attracts her, and she belongs to Japanese cultural organizations. She is keen on Oprah and Judge Judy.

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Dorothyand spouse Robert Bryant live in a South Berkeley house they designed and built, “literally, with our own hands,” in 1980. They have grown children and 2 grandsons. Now 80 years old, Dorothy taught school for 23 years, resigned to devote full time to writing, from which she has never retired.

Dorothy takes several prescription meds, but refused estrogen. “I’m on Kaiser Senior Advantage, which taps into Medicare funds. I have an advance health care directive filed with Kaiser, with copies at home.” The Bryants drive one car.

“Music is very important to me. Attend a classical concert, on average, once a week. Berkeley Opera. San Francisco Opera when we can get ‘senior rush’ tickets. I play the piano every day for about an hour. I attend George Yoshida’s Tai Chi class at the South Berkeley Senior Center.” (See Dorothy’s July 30, 2009 Planet piece about him.)

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Sixty-two year old “Mr. Keller”is employed by the Berkeley Adult School as a literature instructor. Shakespeare and film are his forte. His Contra Costa County residence requires 1 bus + 2 trains. “I teach at North Berkeley [senior center.] In recent years, the administration has gone from bad to worse. Totally indifferent and hostile supervisor.” Right on!

Asked whether he has ever been inside a nursing home, James Keller responds “Yes, as a visitor. Sad places which I have mentioned in my plays.” He uses 4 public libraries and “will be fully employed writing and teaching until death.” A registered voter who was born and raised in Australia and London, James has been earning his living since age 15. Asked whether he would open the door to someone who rings the door bell at 2 AM, he responds wisely, no.

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“A printer by trade and a rebel by nature,” reads 84-year old Harry Antero Siitonen’s card. Harry is bilingual and an extremely interesting person. His parents were Finnish farmers and socialists who immigrated to Massachusetts, where he grew up. Asked whether he’s a registered voter, he responds with an “of course” attitude.

Harry is a Lodger – that is, he lives in Strawberry Creek Lodge and is involved in the Tenants Association. He has served as president and is “looking forward to the Reno trip.” Despite Social Security and union pension, he is on the SCL Section 8 waiting list.

World War II Navy service provided his G I Bill education. Now he uses Veterans Administration health services, but his hearing aids are unsuccessful. He takes one prescription med, “used to” smoke and drink. “Monday I do gym at 24 hour Fitness and have a Rosen Therapy session at 1:15 PM at SCL.” He also enjoys the Berkeley Public Library’s play-reading group at Central.

Harry walks and bikes -- keeps his bicycle on his balcony. Does he feel secure in the streets? “Dangerous to go out at night…carry a cane on public transit… VA physician encouraged it.” Asked about volunteer work, he focused on labor, his lifelong concern. He had to quit the Alameda Central Labor Council because of his hearing but he writes for the Finnish-American newspaper, and he pickets.

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Seventy-five year-old Jane Eiseley is another fascinating Lodger. We chatted and enjoyed the Bay views from her one-bedroom apartment’s balcony, laden with plants and bird-feeders. She too is involved in the SCL Tenants Association, spear-heading response to the management company’s attempt to increase rents. Before retirement she was a research analyst, working for Wisconsin on statistical reports on the supply of licensed health professionals. She has free-lanced as a Historic Preservation Consultant. Her University of Wisconsin BA and MA are in history and urban affairs,

Does Jane feel secure in the streets? “No”. She has a car and SCL parking stall. An Audubon and Turtle Island member, she has testified at Berkeley City Council meetings. Her preference is fiction, although she is currently reading Miracle in the Andes…:. She takes yoga at North Berkeley Senior Center. Jane, uniquely, was aware of the recent Elmwood Nursing Home scandal. (See April 1, 2010 Planet.)

The Goddard houses at 2531 and 2535 Etna St. are two of three originally built on this site.

Daniella Thompson

Julia Morgan designed 2733 Ashby Place for the Goddards after completion of the Parker and Etna St. houses. This house will be open on the BAHA Julia Morgan House Tour on May 2.

Daniella Thompson

Julia Morgan designed 2816 Derby St. in 1908 as a rental income property for herself and Ira Hoover. The layout echoes that of 2733 Ashby Place. This house will be open on BAHA's House Tour, May 2.

Daniella Thompson

2814 Derby St., a mirror-image twin of its next-door neighbor, will be open on BAHA's House Tour, May 2.

Malcolm Goddard, D.D.S. in a passport photo on the eve of his move to France, March 1920.

Around the turn of the last century, it was common practice for middle-class or well-to-do families with adolescent children to move their residence to Berkeley in order to secure good education for their young. Among those was the household of Clark and Louise Goddard.

Clark La Motte Goddard, A.B., D.D.S., A.M., born 1849 in Beloit, Wisconsin, was Emeritus Professor of Orthodontia and former dean of the University of California’s College of Dentistry. His scholarship, analytical turn of mind, great mechanical ingenuity, and superior manipulative skill combined to make him one of the West Coast’s preeminent dentists.

In 1881, Dr. Goddard married Emily Louise Bunker, born 1857 in Barnard, Maine. Their union produced two children, Malcolm (b. 1883) and Florence (b. 1886). Great travelers, the Goddards took their children to Europe and kept a motorcar for trips around California. Dr. Goddard was an accomplished amateur photographer; his collection of over 1,100 prints and negatives is housed at the Bancroft Library on the UC campus.

About 1902, the Goddards moved from Oakland to Berkeley, where Malcolm enrolled at the University of California and Florence entered Miss Head’s School.

For a couple of years, the family lived in a rented house on Hillside Avenue near Dwight Way. In 1904, they built their own house at 2647 Dwight Way. The architect was Oakland-based D. Franklin Oliver, who was building the First Congregational Church of Alameda at the same time. Two years later, Oliver would design the six-story Breuner Furniture Company building at 13th and Franklin, now part of the Oakland Tribune Tower.

The Goddard house survived into the mid-1950s, converted into seven apartments before being razed to make way for UC’s Unit 2 student residence halls.

On March 30, 1905, Dr. Goddard dropped dead on the sidewalk in front of the San Francisco ferry building while waiting for the boat to Berkeley. He was 55 years old. Goddard left an estate valued at $122,000, of which about $80,000 were out on loan to many individuals.

Almost immediately after her husband’s death, Louise Goddard began investing in real estate. In May 1905, she acquired lots on Parker and Etna streets and proceeded to build three shingled two-story houses at each location. Julia Morgan designed at least five and possibly all six of these houses.

The architect was then at the beginning of her long and prolific career. The first woman to study architecture at the prestigious École des Beaux-Arts in Paris, Julia Morgan returned to the Bay Area in 1902. Almost immediately, she opened her own practice out of her parents’ home, taking on private clients even as she assisted John Galen Howard with major UC projects such as the Hearst Greek Theatre and the Hearst Memorial Mining Building.

Morgan obtained her state architect’s license in March 1904 and opened an office in San Francisco. By then, she had already designed El Campanil on the Mills College campus, and within two years she would take charge of reconstructing the Fairmont Hotel on Nob Hill. During her 45-year career, Julia Morgan would design over 700 private and public buildings, most of them completed.

How Louise Goddard came to know Julia Morgan is not clear, but the connection was likely to have come about through the vast women’s network - including clubs and sororities — through which many of the architect’s commissions were funneled.

In December 1905, while the houses on Parker and Etna streets were under construction, Louise, Malcolm, and Florence Goddard purchased three lots on Elmwood Avenue (now Ashby Place). In 1907, Mrs. Goddard commissioned Julia Morgan to design a speculative house on the westernmost lot.

The first five or six houses Morgan designed for the Goddards were relatively modest and clad in redwood. The new house was more substantial, costlier ($4,500 vs. $2,900), and the only one clad in stucco, a material just coming into popular use in Berkeley.

The first tenant at 2733 Ashby Place was George G. Towle, the son of lumber baron Allen Towle, who owned the town of Towle near Dutch Flat in Placer County and had diverse business interests, including lumber, logging, sawmills, crate manufacturing, mining, pulp mills, narrow-gauge railroads, and vast landholdings.

George managed the Towle Estate Company. His daughter, Katherine, who grew up to become the University of California’s Dean of Women, reminisced about those days: “I’m quite certain the family’s decision to move [from Oakland] was because of the schools, and Berkeley was then a very attractive place to live. We rented a house on what was then called Elmwood Avenue. It’s now Ashby Place. You know, it’s down there off College Avenue. Those were just nothing but fields, you know. There were a few houses, ours among them.”

On narrow lots, Julia Morgan liked to position the entrance halfway down the side of the house, so the hall and stairwell were centrally located for easy access to all rooms. The Goddard house at 2733 Ashby Place is a good example of this design principle. The architect would recreate its floor plans on a slightly smaller scale in two shingled rental houses she and her partner, Ira Hoover, built at 2814 and 2816 Derby Street in 1909. All three houses will be open on Sunday, May 2, during the Berkeley Architectural Heritage Association’s annual Spring House Tour, devoted this year to Julia Morgan’s early residential work in the Claremont and Elmwood districts.

The Goddards continued to live at 2647 Dwight Way until Florence married Justin Warren McKibben in late 1910 and set up housekeeping at 15 Alvarado Road. Louise and Malcolm, the latter now a dentist, let the Dwight Way house and took up temporary residence in the Hotel Carlton on Telegraph Avenue.

In 1914, when the McKibbens built a new house at 2522 Piedmont Avenue, they called Harris C. Allen, not Julia Morgan, to design it. Malcolm Goddard also looked elsewhere for his proposed residence in Walnut Creek. The first architectural presentation for that house was made in 1914 by Irving F. Morrow. For some reason, Morrow’s design was not executed, and Julia Morgan ended up working on the same project a year later.

Engaged to a young society woman since 1912, Malcolm mysteriously remained single, his much publicized and long-awaited 1913 nuptials having fallen through without so much as a murmur in the press. He maintained a private practice in San Francisco, taught Comparative Anatomy and Odontology at the UC College of Dentistry, and was active in the Association of Allied Dental Societies. While waiting for his Walnut Creek house to be completed, he resided at one of his mother’s Parker Street houses.

An enthusiastic mountain climber, Malcolm utilized his expeditions for scientific exploration. In 1903, he participated in a paleontological expedition to Southern Idaho and later published the paper “Fish Remains from the Marine Lower Triassic of Aspen Ridge, Idaho” in the University of California’s Bulletin of the Department of Geology. In July 1912, he was the first person to ascend and survey several mountains around Lake Chilko in British Columbia. He named one of those peaks Mount Merriam, after Professor John C. Merriam, the UC paleontologist. Another peak was later named Mount Goddard in his honor.

In 1917, after the United States entered World War I, Malcolm enlisted in the Army’s Dental Corps and was shipped to France, where he served as a dental surgeon in base and field hospitals in the Auvergne and in Paris. Promoted to the rank of Captain, he was mustered out in September 1919.

Meanwhile, Louise Goddard had established residence in one of her Julia Morgan-designed houses on Etna Street. After returning from Europe, Malcolm lived with her for a few months, but in early 1920 he surprised his friends by announcing that he would be returning to Paris to make his home there. He was by no means the only UC Dental College graduate practicing abroad. In 1931, the Oakland Tribune named 45 men trained in this school who were practicing in other countries, including three in Paris.

Paris in the 1920s was the world’s most dazzling metropolis, enticing thousands of American musicians, artists, and writers. Malcolm Goddard had for society an illustrious circle of expatriates and visitors. In 1927, he was a guest at the Paris wedding of a Berkeley couple: Samuel J. Hume, notable theatrical director and scholar, and Portia Bell, then studying sculpture and later a well-known psychiatrist. Also present at the wedding were Mr. and Mrs. Robert Gordon Sproul, who were traveling through Europe.

In the spring of 1921, Louise Goddard sailed to France for a prolonged visit with her son. She died on Dec. 29, 1921, two months after her return to Berkeley.

While Florence Goddard McKibben lived on Piedmont Avenue and raised four children, her brother Malcolm persisted in his peripatetic life. In 1925, he went on safari in the French Cameroons, followed by a 1929–30 safari in French Sudan. In 1931, he retired from dentistry and moved to Buea, British Cameroons, establishing a ranch where he crossed the native Nigerian cattle with European stock.

Malcolm continued his scientific expeditions, sailing to the Gulf of Guinea and exploring the mouth of the Niger River. When the Straus West African Expedition of the Chicago Natural History Museum spent a month in the summer of 1934 collecting birds on Mount Cameroon, Dr. Goddard, now married, donated three specimens.

In the summer of 1938, Malcolm Goddard placed his 24-foot motor sail boat on board a banana boat for Hamburg and sailed alone through the Kiel Canal and along the fjords to Oslo. He had planned to continue sailing to the North Cape, but a heart attack felled him on August 24. Like his father, Malcolm was 55 at the time of his death. He was buried alongside the Goddards and the McKibbens in Plot 15 of Mountain View Cemetery, Oakland.

Of all the Goddards, Florence was the longest-lived. She passed away in 1958, a year after Julia Morgan’s death.

BAHA’s Julia Morgan House Tour will take place on Sunday, May 2, from 1 to 5 pm. For further information and tickets, visit http://berkeleyheritage.com.

ASHKENAZ -- "I Like My Bike Night," First Friday of the month, 9 p.m. This monthly series brings bicycle innovators, enthusiasts, artists and organizations together under one roof, as well as encourages regular Ashkenaz show-goers to leave their cars in the driveway and arrive at the venue by bicycle instead. $8-$25.

CALIFORNIA GENEALOGICAL SOCIETY AND LIBRARY -- "California Genealogical Society and Library Free First Saturday," 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Event takes place on the first Saturday of every month, 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Trace and compile your family history at this month's open house event. Free. www.calgensoc.org.

BERKELEY PACIFIC FILM ARCHIVE -- Exploring cinema from the Bay Area and cultures around the world, the Pacific Film Archive offers daily film screenings, including rare and rediscovered prints of movie classics; new and historic works by world famous directors; restored silent films with live musical accompaniment; retrospectives; and new and experimental works. Check Web site for a full schedule of films.

"First Impressions: Free First Thursdays," first Thursday of every month. Special tours and movie presentations. Admission is free.

THE MARSH BERKELEY -- CLOSING -- "East 14: True Tales of a Reluctant Player," through May 8. "East 14th'' chronicles the true tale of a young man raised by his mother and ultra-strict stepfather. $20-$35.

MASQUERS PLAYHOUSE -- CLOSING -- "The Apple Tree," through May 1, Friday and Saturday, 8 p.m.; Sunday, 2 p.m. Play is based on "The Diary of Adam and Eve'' by Mark Twain, "The Lady or the Tiger?'' by Frank R. Stockton and "Passionella'' by Jules Feiffer. $20.

"Music for Lorenzo De' Medici and Maximilian I: Isaac's Missa 'La Bassadanza','' May 2, 5:30 p.m. MusicSources presents a liturgical reconstruction of this work with organ allternatim and plainchat for the Order of the Golden Fleece.

"Sacred and Profane Presents Madness and Mirth," May 7, 8 p.m. Program features works by Benjamin Britten, Per Norgard, Geoffredi Petrassi and William Bergsma. $15-$20. (415) 388-5899, www.scrdprofane.org.

A century ago, theatre changed. The first “modern” play was The Seagull by Anton Chekhov. The usual theater fare then was melodrama which was considered to be high art. The Seagull was people just talking, expressing their innermost longings, mired in incontrovertible conflicts of the heart, and locked in a “union of opposites.” When it opened in St. Petersburg, the audience response was hostile. The actress playing Nina was so frightened that she lost her voice mid-performance, and Chekhov hid backstage after the first act. But fellow playwright and producer Nemirovich-Danchenko saw the play’s potential and three years later in 1898 convinced C. Stanislavski to direct it for their Moscow Art Theatre. The rest is history. The MAT brought its work to NYC in the ‘20’s, the crowd gasped when actors just behaved and engaged in such startling and ground-breaking staging as turning their back on the audience while conversing. It overwhelmed the audience with a naturalism that set a new tone and mode which would be the forefather of film acting. The crest of the Moscow Art Theatre still bears a seagull.

Many famous playwrights since have had a shot at adapting this seminal play, among them The Notebook of Trigorin in 1981 by Tennessee Williams (who said The Seagull was his inspiration to write plays), Tom Stoppard in 1997, and now Emily Mann with her SEAGULL IN THE HAMPTONS now playing at Shotgun Players at their Ashby Stage home.

Taking Ms. Mann’s wholly accessible work, Reid Davis has directed a seamless, marvelously cast version. Ms. Mann has set in a familiar yet parallel place where actors and writers still might keep a summer house. She spices it with recognizable references (Meryl Streep, Peter Brooks, Judy Dench, New Yorker cartoons, Red Bull fueled pre-show nerves, boom-boxes) and adapts the dialogue to post-post-modern phrasing which is much closer to the subtext of the original lines, and thereby suits this pseudo-modern century’s more candid, “out-there” parlance. Reid Davis wisely cast the actors and each fulfills the well-written roles of fully-formed, compelling portraits of recognizable characters and their motivations regardless of the size of their role. It’s a play about relationships—and even a touch of the “Gossip Girl” soap opera with so many dalliances between the characters—but full of philosophical and psychological insight. I attended Wednesday last, late in the run. It has played to very positive reviews; after seasoning through weeks of performance, it soared.

Chekhov has had a bum rap as being boring. It’s hard to read. The problem has been the clunky translations by academics using formal language that betrayed the conversational tone, the foreign and complicated Russian names that are hard to keep track of, and the directing of it as a “holy theatre” dramatic piece rather than the comedy that Chekhov specifies it to be. The play rides the line between satire and comedy; it makes fun of art-obsessed theatre people, writers and their minions while contrasting them to regular hardscrabble folks who work for a living yet live in awe of the superstars. It masterfully invokes the ironic mode in which we don’t want to be those people and we stand outside the fray and laugh at them; then at other times in the empathetic mode, we walk in their shoes and our hearts go out to them. Emily Mann reveals, “If I see another one of these Seagulls that doesn’t get a laugh and everyone’s in a corset, I’m going to scream. Chekhov was a stage rat. He knew what a funny line was. He knew actors. He understood what would and wouldn’t work on stage. He understood the humor in everyday misery….” (Read her entire interview at http://www.mccarter.org/Education/seagull/html/6.html)

The maker and shaker of this little world is the Queen Bee middle-aged actress Maria (Irina Arkadina in Chekhov). Trish Mulholland is the perfect technicolor diva with moods turning on a dime; if Maria weren’t an actress, we would call her bipolar with a narcissistic personality disorder. She is the materfamilias, the provider who bounces from stingy to beneficent, and the ultimate “cougar” in ringlets who plans never to age. I foresee an award for this performance; it would be worth it to go just to see her dominate everyone including her younger lover who she straddles and browbeats with her mercurial moods and mind-games.

Kelsey Ventner plays the giddy, overprotected, star-struck Nina with wonderful physical expressiveness, movingly nubile in her sun dress. All the men drool, and she is irresistible with her innocence. The Greeks, who had a word for every dramatic device, used the term “pharmakos” for the sacrificial lamb which “a man passing by, for want of anything better to do, destroys,” and she personifies that archetype. The fishing-hole scene with the writer Philip (Trigorin) is a dance of mutual moths to mutual flames. The director’s choreography in this and the countless arrivals and departures of the large cast goes unnoticed in its artistry unless you’re looking for it, which is high praise.

Brooding, abandoned Alex—Chekhov’s Treplev the son—is played by Liam Callister with an appropriately inherited manic-depressive temperament as a cautionary character out of Columbine High who seems to be a danger to himself or others. His apple-cheeked countenance and little boy haircut plays in counterpoint to his radical alienation and melancholy. His strange, symbolist monologue about Creation and Apocalypse are more relevant today than in 1898, since we now know about the Big Bang, tectonic plate movement, entropy, evolution, and global warming.

There are great moments throughout, from the pre-show “turn off your cell” announcement done in character by the Caretaker Lorenzo played by Mark Manske and his Wife Paula played by Beth Dietchman who interrupt one another like any contemporary bickering couple. There is a moment between Harold (Medvedenko in Chekhov) played by with nerdy aplomb by Andy Alabran who worships Milly (Masha in Chekhov) who rejects him for the unrequited love of Alex. He is eating vanilla wafers, and puts one on her thigh for her; she brushes it away, wasting food and insulting his offer; he puts another, again brushed away, and another, until she relents and eats one—it serves as a foreshadowing metaphor in dumb-show for the way he wears her down to eventually giving in to him.

Philip (Trigorin the writer) is played with 30-year-old charm and reserve by Alex Moggridge. At 30-ish, you can still hit on 18-year-olds while you have a sugar-mama. His confession about his obsession with writing—and the old artist’s dilemma they joke about that, no matter how tragic or desperate the situation, there is a little voice in the back of the head saying, “Remember this; you can use it.”—is Chekhov’s personalized perspective. Moggridge takes us through the convoluted thought-process of the monologue without missing a beat or an implication. Chekhov put himself into the work through Philip/Trigorin the obsessed writer as well as through the doctor, here called Ben (Dr. Dorn in Chekhov), a Silver Fox who has an affair with the groundskeeper’s wife, flirts with Nina, and has an ancient thing with Maria. Chekhov was a doctor who forsook his practice for writing, and was an extraordinarily handsome man who was---what is the Russian word for catnip?—to the ladies. If there is a moderator, it is Ben played by British actor John Mercer whose dialect and manner set him apart in this role and keeps him outside the fray.

Robert Broadfoot’s set of a sandy beach L-shaped dock with sunken piers and two platforms behind provide a playable platea for summer sunning under a Tommy Bahama beach umbrella and the outdoor stage where the theatrical conflict begins. The entire stage is framed by the receding wooden arches of the old church. The addition of rattan furniture takes us inside for more summer behind-closed-doors drama. By reconfiguring and covering the furniture, we enter a dark living room and move to winter. Backed by a hanging beachscape panoramic painting which lighting designer Matthew Royce uses to bounce light off of to truly transport us to the beach in the various seasons (sky light that this East Coast boy remembers well). This production is a model of collaboration, and the smooth and motivated scene changes are an object lesson for all incipient directors. Sound designer Erik Pearson’s quirky, invocative choices of entr’acte music (Sinatra’s “Summer Wind” to “I Pagliacci”) serves as tongue-in-cheek commentary while setting the mood.

Easy summer wear of plaid or white Bermuda shorts and other classy beachwear allows us to relax into the naturalism of the play but costumer Victoria Livingston Hall has some real fun with Uncle Nicky’s (Sorin) blue blazer, white trousers, pink necktie and deck shoes for the closeted gay portrayal done so deftly by Richard Louis James (Nicholas/Sorin); the outfit could be out of Noel Coward or “La Cage aux Folles.” Her costuming of Anna Ishida (Milly/Masha) in dark clothes and Doc Marten boots provides inspiration for the actress’s spirited and transforming portrayal of a rebellious, defensive, antsy, cigarette-smoking, alcohol- abusing petulant Goth teenager with a crush on all artists, who in Act Two turns into an alcohol- abusing, burdened, husband-loathing wife who settled for second-best. Little touches like simple ripped jeans for the penniless Alex, then a hooded sweatshirt for a quick scene of rejection of his mother and her lover evokes Hamlet’s “too much in the sun/son” moment ---the original play is rife with Hamlet quotes and parallel—or at minimum reminds us of the Unibomber.

Emily Mann had two hits here in the 80’s: Still Life about coming home from Viet Nam which won six Obies, and Execution of Justice about the People vs. Dan White that the old Eureka Theater commissioned. SEAGULL AT THE HAMPTONS premiered with her directing her own work at the McCarter Theater Center in Princeton, New Jersey, in 2008 where she is artistic director, and has adapted three other Chekhov favorite.

A word about the theater experience at Shotgun: Shotgun is hip and friendly. As you walk up to it, it reaches out to meet you with ever-changing painted info on the outside wall and a real, old-time marquee outlined in light bulbs that you expect to starting “chasing.” Box officer Jonathan Kreuze greeted us at the door attired in red shirt, black tie and jacket and snappy straw porkpie hat. Jonathan is genuinely gregarious, and was welcoming two older subscribers, bestowing free tickets for champagne and logo-ed water bottles to them. The lobby and entrance walls are painted a happy burnt umber; you walk down a little labyrinth (a short reorienting trip to the Magical Realm) to an open theater that used to be a church where you sit in pews. You can buy hard liquor and take it to your seat just like in British theaters. The staff is authentically amiable in a relaxed way, and there are almost no hard edges to the experience. The only drawback is that the pews have no cushions on the back—an easily fixed yet heretofore seemingly overlooked situation that older attendees have complained of. Most theater audiences are of an age when this discomfort conflicts with their enjoyment of the production, so I hope they it fix it soon.

Tony Judt is a distinguished scholar, historian, writer, and academic, born in England and based mostly in America. Of his thirteen earlier books, I have read only one. Presently, I am working my way through his 2005 masterpiece Postwar: A History of Europe since 1945. I am more familiar with his highly informed and probing reviews and essays in the New York Review of Books. One of those NYReview essays (December 17, 2009) grew into this book.

I picked it up and put it down half a dozen times—deciding to finish it/not to finish it, to review it/not to review it. My ambivalence came from two sources: the subject matter and the conditions under which was written—both of which are depressing to dwell on.

First, the conditions: the book was dictated—for the same reason that Judt’s last three pieces in the NYReview were dictated: at 62, Judt is in the later stages of ALS (Lou Gehrig’s Disease), immobilized except for his still barely viable vocal apparatus and his totally acute and aware brain (both evident during a recent telephone interview by Terri Gross on “Fresh Air.”) About this condition, the book says nothing, except for his brief acknowledgement and thanks to people who helped. As for the subject matter, Judt departs from his usually cool, fact-packed historical analysis to summarize our present condition, for “the young especially,” citing a “duty to look critically at our world . . .if we think we know what is wrong, we must act upon that knowledge.” His tone of urgency, as well as his command of reasoning and memory, is that of an eloquent deathbed statement rarely attainable outside the world of fiction.

The title comes from two lines of a long poem by Oliver Goldsmith (“The Deserted Village,” 1770, mourning the destruction of a way of life by a law that forced English farmers off their land and into industrial cities.)

“Ill fares the land, to hastening ills a prey,

Where wealth accumulates, and men decay.”

Judt clearly lays out overlapping theses: that the general health and contentment of a society is based less on the total wealth of that society than on the spread of that wealth being “not too unequal.” The history of Western Europe, of England, and of the United States, he says, shows the broader sharing of wealth starting in the late 19th century and reaching a peak in the social legislation of the 1930s Depression, this “less unequal” arrangement holding until the 1970s. “Over the past thirty years we have thrown all this away,” retaining somewhat more of it in Europe, less in Thatcher/Blair England, and much less in America, from Reagan to Bush.

Judt takes the old saying about those who don’t know their history being condemned to repeat it, and adds a dimension: those who have forgotten or never lived through the pre-New Deal to Great Society years, have no idea how grim life was for most people before Social Security, unemployment insurance, government mandated safety laws in industry, etc etc. We should, he says, be fiercely fighting to protect social legislation and government regulatory powers, resisting “privatization” and shouts of “socialism,” used as a synonym for some sinister plot against “freedom.” The very real danger is that we will lose what we have by taking it for granted, by lack of memory, lack of experience, and through sheer lack of imagination. Judt takes upon himself, in what must be a final statement, the work of explaining, reminding, laying out the dimming facts, the short history of nations moving toward becoming “good societies,” bequeathing to a couple of generations, “security, prosperity, social services, and greater equality.” Far from being “socialism,” this good society, was necessarily mixed: “social democracy was always a mongrel politics.”

He offers a vivid but simple metaphor for this mixture. “Imagine a classic railway station (one of those) cathedrals of modern life.” Enterprises like newsstands, shops, or coffee bars in and near the station are best run by private enterprise, competing and surviving according to the quality of their goods and service. “But you cannot run trains competitively by placing two trains on a track and waiting to see which performs better, like two brands of butter on a supermarket shelf.” Exploring simple images like this, he expresses the obvious spheres of private versus public function, disposing of misused justifications for privatization, like “efficiency”; a really “efficient, privatized” railroad would never bother to lay track through sparsely-populated areas. But the role of government ownership or regulation is not to be “efficiently” profitable—it is to bind the country together. From his train station image we can all cite similar examples: “efficient” public schools would expel slow learners with special needs; “efficient” public libraries would buy only the few vapid best-sellers read by the most people.

(If all this should seem to be obvious and clear to everyone, don’t forget one example of present confusion that Judt didn’t need to cite, the mostly sadly hilarious and widely quoted objection to universal health care: “The government should keep hands off my Medicare!” Hello?)

This is a hard book to review because of the temptation to quote from page after page of his compressed but simple, clear explication. At one moment I decide I am learning nothing new by reading it; a moment later, I am rereading one page or another, admiring the connections he makes that help me to more deeply understand and affirm what I “know.”

So just buy the book, or insist that your library buy it, read it, then pass it on to one of the young people Tony Judt wants to reach before he dies.

Kaua’i is an extraordinary place to see seabirds. Kilauea National Wildlife Refuge on the North Shore hosts nesting Laysan albatrosses, red-footed boobies, and wedge-tailed shearwaters. The boobies occupy a wooded slope above the ocean; we watched them bringing in twigs as nesting material. The albatrosses, mostly unpaired adolescents and supersized chicks, use a nearby hill. Almost literally underfoot, the shearwaters had excavated burrows right at the edge of a paved path. Great frigatebirds, long-winged piratical creatures, nest elsewhere but come to Kilauea to steal fish from the hapless boobies.

With all that, I’d have to say that our most memorable seabird encounters involved tropicbirds. Two species breed in the Hawai’ian Islands, the white-tailed (koa’e kea in Hawai’ian) and the red-tailed (koa’e ‘ula). Tropicbirds are sleek, long-winged birds, somewhat like terns in appearance except for the pair of elongated feathers that extend from their tails. As you would expect, these streamers are red in the red-tailed tropicbird and usually white in the white-tailed, although we saw one individual white-tail with salmon-pink streamers. The red-tail’s feathers were used in traditional Hawai’ian regalia.

Although we saw red-tails only at Kilauea, we ran into at least a white-tailed tropicbird or two almost every day: in Waimea Canyon, near Poi’pu on the South Shore, at Wailua and ‘Opaeka’a falls on the east side. We watched them gliding above W. S. Merwin’s folding cliffs in the Kalalau Valley, in and out of the constantly moving fog. When a stray sunbeam hit them, their white plumage lit up.

Tropicbirds have traditionally been assigned to the order of birds that includes pelicans, cormorants, anhingas, gannets, boobies, and frigatebirds, with which they share totipalmate feet: all four toes connected by webbing. But a major phylogenetic study in 2008 grouped them in a lineage that included pigeons and doves, sandgrouse, grebes, and flamingos. Their fossil record is sparse, although 50-million-year-old remains in England have been attributed to a tropicbird or close relative.

Superbly adapted for flight, tropicbirds have small, weak legs and feet that are barely adequate for terra firma. “When they move short distances, they shuffle forward by pushing with both feet and falling forward on their bellies,” writes Craig Harrison in Seabirds of Hawaii: Natural History and Conservation. They don’t swim well either. But in flight they’re grace incarnate, turning and twisting to capture flyingfish, squid, mackerel scad, and sauries, or to evade a pursuing frigatebird. Red-tailed tropicbirds can pick off flyingfish on the wing.

Tropicbird courtship is aerobatic. We did not get to see the courtship flight of the white-tailed tropicbird, in which a pair glides in tandem, the male’s tail streamers touching the female’s back. However, we caught the red-tails’ performance at the Kilauea refuge: a half-dozen birds facing into the wind and back-pedaling so as to leapfrog their neighbors. This is accompanied by the strident vocalizations that led sailors to call them bosun birds, for the sound of the boatswain’s whistle.

The two species have different nesting habitat preferences. Red-tails lay their single egg under concealing vegetation on flat clifftops overlooking the sea. White-tails use crevices in inland canyons, often near waterfalls. Twice we watched a white-tail spiral down toward a cliff face and suddenly disappear into an undetectable cavity in the rock wall. These birds also nest on the rims of the still-active craters of the other Kilauea on the Big Island, about as predator-proof a site as you can imagine.

Both sexes incubate the single egg. Depending on site availability, red-tails can be loosely colonial, but they are far from neighborly.

A cultural sidebar: the annual Merrie Monarch hula competition took place at Hilo on the Big Island while we were on Kaua’i. (The monarch in question: King David Kalakaua, who helped rehabilitate the hula after its suppression by missionaries.) The winning group this year, Ke Kai O Kahiki, performed a tropicbird-inspired routine including a jumping move called kenapulu that evoked the birds’ diving maneuvers. You can see it on YouTube.

They did not, however, try to imitate the backward-circling dance of the red-tailed tropicbird. That’s something I would happily pay to see.

Spring showers will give way to local, native, wildflowers this weekend as a number of local homeowners invite the public into their gardens.

This Sunday is the 6th Annual Bringing Back the Natives Garden Tour, featuring several Berkeley and Berkeley-area gardens.

The focus of the free tour is, as the name implies, growing California native species in the home garden. The gardens typically range from those of native purists—who don’t water, and exclude all introduced species—to gardens where native and drought-tolerant species predominate but also harmonize with other plantings.

Some are designed by professionals, others homemade and homegrown. They range from a few hundred square feet in the flatlands to extensive and complex properties in the Berkeley hills.

Berkeley sites include the Fleming Garden on Shasta Road, where the owners began gardening with natives in the 1950s and have created a spectacular hillside native enclave above an artificial stream, and swimming pool.

The tour brochure describes it as “the leading native plant garden in private ownership in California” and, having visited before, I can tell you it’s a sight to see. There’s a front yard grove of native trees with a shady wall covered with native ferns; around the back of the house a switchback path climbs an artfully gardened slope into the sun and Bay views.

The garden of Glen Schneider on California Street is also a tour regular. It’s intended to be “reminiscent of what the Berkeley flats might have looked like prior to the arrival of Europeans” and is planted with only native species gathered by seed or cutting within three miles of the garden.

There are 12 gardens open in Berkeley, Albany, El Cerrito, and the southern tip of Richmond for this tour, and several in Oakland and Alameda, plus others further afield over the hills, from Pinole to Livermore to Martinez and Moraga. Four of the Berkeley gardens are listed as new to the tour since last year.

A number of public gardens, school gardens, research gardens, and native plant nurseries will also be featured on the tour. They include the ever-fascinating California Native Bee Garden (on the University of California’s Oxford Tract, just northwest of the campus), the Alameda Butterfly Habitat in a schoolyard, and the Native Here Nursery in Berkeley.

Native Here—at 101 Gold Course Links Road in Tilden Park—will also be open on Saturday for special sales. East Bay Wilds nursery in Berkeley will be selling plants on Sunday.

The tour runs from 10 am to 5 pm on Sunday, May 2. Children are allowed but must be “closely supervised”. Pets are not allowed.

It’s too late to order a tour brochure on line, but you can register in person on the morning of the tour and pick one up. You need a brochure to get the tour maps, detailed printed garden descriptions and locations, and tear-out tokens for admission.

The gardens are also extensively described, with some pictures, on the Bringing Back the Natives website, so you can take a look in advance for the ones that might be of most interest.

The Berkeley “walk-in” registration site is 1344 Carlotta Street—which is also one of the open gardens. But don’t go there before 10 am on Sunday. The website also lists nine other scattered registration gardens.

The tour is free—funded by government agency and private grants and donations--but this year the organizers have included a prominent appeal in the brochure asking attendees to consider voluntarily donating $10 minimum per person (for the whole tour, not each garden). There will be donation jars at the open gardens.

Note: this tour always seems to conflict with the annual Berkeley Architectural Heritage Association (BAHA) House Tour which this year also takes place on Sunday the 2nd. I’m going to the House Tour which is in the afternoon and features nine spectacular Julia Morgan homes. However, I’ve learned from experience of past years that it’s possible to visit at least two or three of the local native gardens starting at 10:00 am and still get to the BAHA Tour in plenty of time. Both events can be enjoyed.

Steven Finacom is on the Board of the Berkeley Architectural Heritage Association, and has written for the Planet about numerous community, garden, and historic events.)

BAY AREA RAIL TRAILS -- A network of trails converted from unused railway corridors and developed by the Rails to Trails Conservancy.

BLACK DIAMOND MINES REGIONAL PRESERVE RAILROAD BED TRAIL -- This easy one mile long rail trail on Mount Diablo leads to many historic sites within the preserve. Suitable for walking, horseback riding, and mountain biking. Accessible year round but may be muddy during the rainy season. Enter from the Park Entrance Station parking lot on the East side of Somersville Road, Antioch.

IRON HORSE REGIONAL TRAIL -- The paved trail has grown into a 23 mile path between Concord and San Ramon with a link into Dublin. The trail runs from the north end of Monument Boulevard at Mohr Lane, east to Interstate 680, in Concord through Walnut Creek to just south of Village Green Park in San Ramon. It will eventually extend from Suisun Bay to Pleasanton and has been nominated as a Community Millennium Trail under the U.S. Millennium Trails program. A smooth shaded trail suitable for walkers, cyclists, skaters and strollers. It is also wheelchair accessible. Difficulty: easy to moderate in small chunks; hard if taken as a whole.

LAFAYETTE/MORAGA REGIONAL TRAIL -- A 7.65 mile paved trail converted from the Sacramento Northern Rail line. This 20-year old trail goes along Las Trampas Creek and parallels St. Mary's Road. Suitable for walkers, equestrians, and cyclists. Runs from Olympic Boulevard and Pleasant Hill Road in Lafayette to Moraga. The trail can be used year round.

OHLONE GREENWAY -- A 3.75-mile paved trail converted from the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe railway. Suitable for walkers, strollers and skaters. It is also wheelchair accessible. The trail runs under elevated BART tracks from Conlon and Key Streets in El Cerrito to Virginia and Acton Streets in Berkeley.

SHEPHERD CANYON TRAIL -- An easy 3-mile paved trail converted from the Sacramento Northern Rail Line. The tree-lined trail is gently sloping and generally follows Shepherd Canyon Road. Suitable for walkers and cyclists. It is also wheelchair accessible. Begins in Montclair Village behind McCaulou's Department Store on Medau Place and ends at Paso Robles Drive, Oakland. Useable year round.

BAY AREA RIDGE TRAIL -- The Bay Area Ridge Trail, when completed, will be a 400-mile regional trail system that will form a loop around the entire San Francisco Bay region, linking 75 public parks and open spaces to thousands of people and hundreds of communities. Hikes on portions of the trail are available through the Bay Area Ridge Trail Council. Call for meeting sites.

ALAMEDA COUNTY -- "Lake Chabot Bike Rides." These rides are for strong beginners and intermediates to build skill, strength and endurance at a non hammerhead pace. No one will be dropped. Reservations required. Distance: 14 miles. Elevation gain: 1,000 feet. Difficulty: beginner to intermediate. Pace: moderate. Meeting place: Lake Chabot Road at the main entrance to the park. Thursday, 6:15 a.m. (510) 468-3582.

CAMRON-STANFORD HOUSE -- The Camron-Stanford House, an 1876 Italianate-style home that was at one time the Oakland Public Museum, has been restored and furnished with appropriate period furnishings by the Camron-Stanford House Preservation Association. It is the last Victorian house on Lake Merritt's shore. Call ahead to confirm tours and hours.

$3-$5; free children ages 11 and under when accompanied by a paying adult; free the first Sunday of the month. Third Wednesday of the month, 1-5 p.m. 1418 Lakeside Drive at 14th Street, Oakland. (510) 444-1876, www.cshouse.org.

CASA PERALTA -- Once the home of descendants of the 19th-century Spanish soldier and Alameda County landowner Don Luis Maria Peralta, the 1821 adobe was remodeled in 1926 as a grand Spanish villa, using some of the original bricks. The casa features a beautiful Moorish exterior design and hand painted tiles imported from Spain, some of which tell the story of Don Quixote. The interior is furnished in 1920s decor. The house will be decorated for the holidays during the month of December. Call ahead to confirm hours.

CLOSE TO HOME: EXPLORING NATURE'S TREASURES IN THE EAST BAY -- A yearlong program of monthly talks and Saturday outings about the natural history of the East Bay. In this hands-on program learn about the plants, wildlife and watershed of the East Bay's incredibly rich and dynamic bioregion. The 11 Saturday outings will take place in either Alameda or Contra Costa counties. The 10 talks at the Montclair Presbyterian Church will be on the Monday prior to the Saturday outing. A notebook of relevant readings and resources for each outing is available to all participants for an additional $30 per person. The program is cosponsored by the Oakland Museum of California, BayNature Magazine and Earthlight Magazine. Fee for the year covers all outings, talks, site fees, orientation and a party.

"Wildlife Corridors," May 3. Join Jim Hale, wildlife biologist who is currently tracking cougars, badgers and river otters in the East Bay.

"Creek Seekers Express," May 8, 9 a.m.-3 p.m. Climb aboard Amtrak at Jack London Square and ride to Martinez with Christopher Richard, curator of Aquatic Biology at the Oakland Museum of California. The 14 creeks that the trip will pass over all connect to the bay and each one has its own story. Check Web site for more field trip details.

EUGENE O'NEILL NATIONAL HISTORIC SITE -- Closed on New Year's Day. Visit Eugene O'Neill's famous Tao House and its tranquil grounds. Phone reservations required for a ranger-led, twoand-a-half-hour tour. Tours are given Wednesday through Sunday at 10 a.m. and 12:30 p.m. Please note: The National Park Service provides a free shuttle van for transportation to Tao House. Access via private vehicle is not available.

FIFTY-PLUS ADVENTURE WALKS AND RUNS -- The walks and runs are 3-mile round-trips, lasting about one hour on the trail. All levels of ability are welcome. The walks are brisk, however, and may include some uphill terrain. Events are held rain or shine and on all holidays except Christmas and the Fifty-Plus Annual Fitness Weekend. Call for dates, times and details.

FOREST HOME FARMS -- The 16-acre former farm of the Boone family is now a municipal historic park in San Ramon. It is located at the base of the East Bay Hills and is divided into two parts by Oak Creek. The Boone House is a 22-room Dutch colonial that has been remodeled several times since it was built in 1900. Also on the property are a barn built in the period from 1850 to 1860; the Victorian-style David Glass House, dating from the late 1860s to early 1870s; a storage structure for farm equipment and automobiles; and a walnut processing plant.

GOLDEN GATE LIVE STEAMERS -- Small locomotives, meticulously scaled to size, run along a half mile of track in Tilden Regional Park. The small trains are owned and maintained by a non-profit group of railroad buffs that offer rides. Come out for the monthly family run and barbeque at the track, offered on the fourth Sunday of the month.

GOLDEN STATE MODEL RAILROAD MUSEUM -- 2010 season opens April 4. The museum, which is handicapped accessible, features extensive displays of operating model railroads constructed and operated by the East Bay Model Engineers Society. Covering some 10,000 square feet, steam and modern diesel-powered freight and passenger trains operate in O, HO and N scales on separate layouts as well as narrow gauge and trolley lines. Of special interest is the Tehachapi Pass and Loop on the N-scale layout showing how the multiple engine trains traverse the gorges and tunnels, passing over themselves to gain altitude to cross Tehachapi Summit just east of Bakersfield. The layouts include such famous railroad landmarks as Niles Canyon, Donner Pass and the Oakland Mole where transcontinental passengers were ferried across San Francisco Bay from their arriving trains. VIEW THE LAYOUTS ONLY ON WEDNESDAYS AND SATURDAYS; WATCH TRAINS RUN ON THE LAYOUTS ON SUNDAYS.

GONDOLA SERVIZIO -- "Gondola Servizio." Weather permitting. Take a ride around Lake Merritt in a real Venetian gondola rowed by a Venetian-style gondolier. The boats of Gondola Servizio were built by hand in Venice. Each gondola seats up to six people and reservations are required.

JOHN MUIR NATIONAL HISTORIC SITE -- The site preserves the 1882 Muir House, a 17-room Victorian mansion where naturalist John Muir lived from 1890 to his death in 1914. It was here that Muir wrote about preserving America's wilderness and helped create the national parks idea for the United States. The house is situated on a hill overlooking the City of Martinez and surrounded by nine acres of vineyards and orchards. Take a self-guided tour of this well-known Scottish naturalist's home. Also part of the site is the historic Martinez Adobe and Mount Wanda.

Public Tours of the John Muir House, Begin with an eight-minute park film and then take the tour. The film runs every 15 minutes throughout the day. Wednesday through Friday, 2 p.m.; Saturday and Sunday, 1 p.m., 2 p.m. and 3 p.m.

MOUNT WANDA -- The mountain consists of 325 acres of grass and oak woodland historically owned by the Muir family. It offers a nature trail and several fire trails for hiking. Open daily, sunrise to sunset.

JOHN MUIR HOUSE, Tours of this well-known Scottish naturalist's home are available. The house, built in 1882, is a 14-room Victorian home situated on a hill overlooking the city of Martinez and surrounded by nine acres of vineyards and orchards. It was here that Muir wrote about preserving America's wilderness and helped create the national parks idea for the United States. The park also includes the historic Vicente Martinez Adobe, built in 1849. An eight-minute film about Muir and the site is shown every 15 minutes throughout the day at the Visitor Center. Self guided tours of the Muir home, the surrounding orchards, and the Martinez Adobe: Wednesday-Sunday, 1 a.m.-5 p.m. Public tours or the first floor of the Muir home: Wednesday-Friday, 2 p.m.; Saturday-Sunday, 2 p.m. and 3 p.m. Reservations not required except for large groups.

LAWRENCE BERKELEY NATIONAL LABORATORY -- Scientists and engineers guide visitors through the research areas of the laboratory, demonstrating emerging technology and discussing the research's current and potential applications. A Berkeley lab tour usually lasts two and a half hours and includes visits to several research areas. Popular tour sites include the Advanced Light Source, The National Center for Electron Microscopy, the 88-Inch Cyclotron, The Advanced Lighting Laboratory and The Human Genome Laboratory. Reservations required at least two weeks in advance of tour. Wear comfortable walking shoes. Photography is permitted. Due to heightened security after Sept. 11, 2001, tour participants will be asked for photo identification and citizenship information. Tours are periodically available by special request. Contact the Community Relations Office, (510) 486-7292, for additional information. To add your name to a list of potential public tour participants, email community@lbl.gov.

MOUNT DIABLO SUMMIT MUSEUM -- The museum is located in a historic stone building atop Mt. Diablo's highest peak and features ongoing exhibits that chronicle the history of the mountain. An instructional video examines the geological forces that created the mountain and panel displays describe the Native American history of the region. A diorama provides an overview of the mountain's ecosystems. Telescopes are mounted on the Observation Deck so visitors can enjoy one of the finest views in the world.

MOUNTAIN VIEW CEMETERY WALKING TOURS -- Take a three-hour, docent-led walking tour of this cemetery, designed by renowned architect Fredrich Law Olmsted, where many historical figures, both local and national, are buried.

Special Events, "Memorial Day Commemoration,'' May 25, 10 a.m. The Mountain View Cemetery honors all veterans with a traditional placing of the wreath and a 21 gun salute, followed by a dove release. The event also features keynote speaker Capt. Keith J. Terro, Commanding Officer of Integrated Support Command in Alameda.

NIMITZ WALK -- A level, paved walk originally constructed when the army was considering putting a missile site in the hills above Berkeley. Near Inspiration Point; from San Pablo Dam Road turn west onto Wildcat Canyon Road in Orinda. The entrance to the walk, and a parking lot, is at the top of the ridge. This is an easy hike for people of all ages and especially ideal for the very old, the very young, and the disabled. Bicycles and roller blades are allowed.

PARDEE HOME MUSEUM -- The historic Pardee Mansion, a three-story Italianate villa built in 1868, was home to three generations of the Pardee family who were instrumental in the civic and cultural development of California and Oakland. The home includes the house, grounds, water tower and barn. Reservations recommended.

RUTH BANCROFT GARDEN -- One of America's finest private gardens, the Ruth Bancroft Garden displays 2,000 specimens from around the world that thrive in an arid climate. Included are African and Mexican succulents, New World cacti, Australian and Chilean trees, and shrubs from California.

DOCENT TOUR SCHEDULE -- Saturdays, 10 a.m. Docent-led tours last approximately an hour and a half. Plant sales follow the tour. By reservation only. $7; free children under age 12.

Gardens open only for tours and special events listed on the garden's telephone information line. 1500 Bancroft Road, Walnut Creek. (925) 210-9663, www.ruthbancroftgarden.org.

SCHARFFEN BERGER CHOCOLATE FACTORY -- This hour-long tour covers the history of chocolate making, from the cultivation of cacao beans to the finished product. After a chocolate tasting, visitors take a walking tour of the factory floor. Open to children 10 and up. Reservations required.

SHADELANDS RANCH HISTORICAL MUSEUM -- Built by Walnut Creek pioneer Hiram Penniman, this 1903 redwoodframed house is a showcase for numerous historical artifacts, many of which belonged to the Pennimans. It also houses a rich archive of Contra Costa and Walnut Creek history in its collections of old newspapers, photographs and government records.

SULPHUR CREEK NATURE CENTER -- A wildlife rehabilitation and education facility where injured and orphaned local wild creatures are rehabilitated and released when possible. There is also a lending library of animals such as guinea pigs, rats, mice and more. The lending fee is $8 per week.

USS HORNET MUSEUM -- Come aboard this World War II aircraft carrier that has been converted into a floating museum. The Hornet, launched in 1943, is 899 feet long and 27 stories high. During World War II she was never hit by an enemy strike or plane and holds the Navy record for number of enemy planes shot down in a week. In 1969 the Hornet recovered the Apollo 11 space capsule containing the first men to walk on the moon, and later recovered Apollo 12. In 1991 the Hornet was designated a National Historic Landmark and is now docked at the same pier she sailed from in 1944. Today, visitors can tour the massive ship, view World War II-era warplanes and experience a simulated aircraft launch from the carrier's deck. Exhibits are being added on an ongoing basis. Allow two to three hours for a visit. Wear comfortable shoes and be prepared to climb steep stairs or ladders. Dress in layers as the ship can be cold. Arrive no later than 2 p.m. to sign up for the engine room and other docent-led tours. Children under age 12 are not allowed in the Engine Room or the Combat Information Center.

The Dazzling Divas will appear at the Berkeley Arts Festival on Sunday, May 2, 2010 at 8 pm

Opera Divas Pamela Connelly, Kathleen Moss and Eliza O’Malley light up the hall with arias, duets and trios from celebrated operas of Puccini, Verdi, Bellini, Bizet, Delibes and more, with master pianist Hadley McCarroll. Come indulge yourself in a dazzling evening of opera's top hits with these Bay Area favorites.

The Berkeley Arts Festival will run for the the entire month of May at 2121 Allston Way, the future home of the Judah L. Magnes Museum in downtown Berkeley. It is across the street from Cancun Taqueria and Gather. Donation $10

Any old messiah can turn water into wine. But wine into water? That takes a community effort.

This Saturday, May 1, the Friends of the Kenney Cottage Garden group is holding a wine event at their garden on Fifth Street in West Berkeley. Several vintages and varieties of donated wine, chocolate, cheese, and other snacks will be available.

A modest $10 donation requested from each attendee will help the group hook up a connection to East Bay MUD water—thus the theme.

The event runs from 2:30 to 6:30 pm at 1629 Fifth Street, just north of Virginia. The location is just around the corner from trendy Fourth Street.

Drop by any time, have some refreshment, view the evolving gardens and talk to the community gardeners. A plant nursery, cisterns, and garden beds are up.

The garden—on a block of Victorian homes and light industrial uses—is turning into a rare community oasis in a neighborhood with few open spaces and public facilities.

The Fifth Street lot, currently owned by the City of Berkeley Redevelopment Agency and leased to the Northern California Land Trust, is planned for a permanent community garden and is also the proposed site of the historic Elizabeth Kenney Cottage.

In conjunction with the garden effort, the NCLT, Berkeley Architectural Heritage Association, and FKCOG—all non-profit groups—are working to raise funds and plan to bring the one story 1880s wooden dwelling to the front of the lot.

The Cottage is the oldest building surviving from early Downtown Berkeley (it once stood on Addison, below Oxford) and is a unique, prefabricated, structure designed and manufactured in Berkeley. It’s currently on a temporary University Avenue site.

The three groups hope to bring it home to West Berkeley where it would be refurbished, in the midst of the community garden, as a neighborhood community and arts center.

If you want to get dirt under your fingernails in a productive cause, there’s an opportunity this weekend.

It’s “Kassa-The First Annual Urban Adobe Festival”. A organization dedicated to building with natural materials—including Adobe brick—has put together the festive event, which includes food and music, to create a supply of adobe bricks for building projects later in the year.

The event is sponsored by Vertical Clay, a “natural building company and school” based in the East Bay.

Sunday’s event is modeled on age-old gatherings in West African villages. “Making adobes is something best done in a group, and a group is happier when there is music”, the organizers say on the Vertical Clay website.

“The Malinke people know this better than anybody; kassa in their tradition is a ritual, very energetic, interchange between work and music…we are borrowing loosely from their tradition to throw an adobe party! Come help us celebrate.”

Anyone is welcome to show up, says Sasha Rabin, one of the leaders of Vertical Clay. Children are welcome, and people can come for as short or as long as they wish. The activity is free. It runs from 12 noon to 5 pm on Sunday, May 2.

The organizers suggest that people wear work clothes—it’s working by hand with clay, after all. Attendees are also encouraged to bring food to share.

If you’re interested in going, the event is at 2314 Howe Street in Berkeley. Howe is a one block long street, running between Telegraph and Ellsworth in south central Berkeley. It enters the west side of Telegraph just north of Ashby.

The activities will also connect through the back yard to the large Chevron service station parking lot at the northwest corner of Ashby and Telegraph.

Vertical Clay does both building projects and teaches hands-on classes in the use of natural building materials—“adobe, cob, earthbag/superadobe, straw-clay, clay wattle, wattle-and-daub, earth and lime plasters, earthen floors, and certain kinds of bamboo and strawbale construction.”

They’ve worked with the B-Tech Academy at Berkeley High School to build a cob oven. In El Sobrante they’re involved with “Villa Sobrante”, a project that is retrofitting a 1940s house with natural building techniques and experimenting with various construction techniques for outbuildings on the 1/3 acre property.

Raw materials for the Berkeley event will come from El Sobrante.

This is the First Annual building event. Will there be more? “Our idea is to continue the event every year in the East Bay at different sites,” Rabin says.

This Sunday, says Rabin, they hope to construct about 300 building blocks. They’ll be earmarked for construction of a courtyard and garden wall at another site.

See the Vertical Clay website for more about Sunday’s event, and about classes and on-going activities.

You can also call (928) 243-2243 for more information, and see the Villa Sobrante blog.

With previews starting Friday, April 30 at 8, at the Berkeley City Club: TERRORISTKA, a new play by Rebecca Bella, directed by Jessica Holt for Threshold Theatre (which began in a Berkeley directors workshop), based on a true story Bella heard while a Fulbright Fellow in Russia, of a young Chechen woman, recruited to be a suicide bomber, journeying to Moscow, told in verse and song. With sound design by Greg Scharpen and costumes by Tammy Berlin, both of Central Works. Thursdays through Saturdays, 8 p. m.; Sundays at 5 2315 Durant Ave. $12-$29. (415) 891-7235; thethresholdproject.blogspot.com

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The Marsh, which continues their presentation of Don Reed's E. 14th, True Tales of a Reluctant Player, an Oakland coming-of-age comedy, through June 30th on their main stage in the Gaia Building (2120 Allston Way, near Shattuck), will open their cabaret in the former Anna's Jazz Island with The Amazing Bubble Man in THE WORLD'S FUNNIEST BUBBLE SHOW, at 11 a. m. May 2, through June 27. Also coming up: Nina Wise's unique improv, WHAT JUST HAPPENED? Fridays at 9, Saturdays at 8, May 7-22, and Anne Randolph's solo show LOVELAND, May 8 (Saturdays at 5, Sundays at 6) through June 13--all in the Cabaret. Various prices. (415) 826-5750; themarsh.org

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It's the last weekend for GREAT EXPECTATIONS, the Dickensian epic by Barbara Field at Contra Costa Civic Theatre, directed by Jeremy Cole (who's worked wonders with both Actors Ensemble and SubShakes). $11=$18. Friday-Saturday, 8; Sunday at 2Pomona Ave. at Moeser Lane, El Cerrito. 524-9132; ccct.org

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Actors Ensemble continues with Sam Shepard's CURSE OF THE STARVING CLASS, directed by Robert Estes and starring a raging Holly Bradford, among others. Friday/Saturday, 8 p. m. through May 22 (plus Thursday, May 20 at 8), Live Oak Theater, 1301 Shattuck, near Berryman. $12-$15 649-5999; aeofberkeley.org

ASHKENAZ -- "I Like My Bike Night," First Friday of the month, 9 p.m. This monthly series brings bicycle innovators, enthusiasts, artists and organizations together under one roof, as well as encourages regular Ashkenaz show-goers to leave their cars in the driveway and arrive at the venue by bicycle instead. $8-$25.

AUCTIONS BY THE BAY -- "ArtiFacts: A Lecture Series for Collectors," Guest curators, scholars and conservation experts from throughout the Bay Area discuss the art of collecting. First Sunday of every month, 3 p.m. $7.

CALIFORNIA GENEALOGICAL SOCIETY AND LIBRARY -- "California Genealogical Society and Library Free First Saturday," 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Event takes place on the first Saturday of every month, 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Trace and compile your family history at this month's open house event. Free. www.calgensoc.org.

2201 Broadway, Suite LL2, Oakland. (510) 663-1358.

CALIFORNIA MAGIC THEATER -- "Dinner Theater Magic Show," Friday-Saturday, 7:30 p.m. Enter the joyous and bewildering world of illusions and magic while chowing down on a home cooked meal. Each weekend features different professional magicians. Recommended for ages 13 and older. $54-$64 includes meal.

DUNSMUIR HOUSE AND GARDENS HISTORIC ESTATE -- Nestled in the Oakland hills, the 50-acre Dunsmuir House and Gardens estate includes the 37-room Neoclassical Revival Dunsmuir Mansion, built by coal and lumber baron Alexander Dunsmuir for his bride. Restored outbuildings set amid landscaped gardens surround the mansion.

ESTATE GROUNDS -- Self-Guided Grounds Tours are available yearround. The 50 acres of gardens and grounds at the mansion are open to the public for walking Tuesday-Friday, 9 a.m.-4 p.m. Booklets and maps of the grounds are available at the Dinkelspiel House. Free.

GUIDED TOURS -- Docent-led tours are available on the first Sunday of each month at 1 p.m. and 2 p.m. (except for July) and Wednesdays at 11 a.m. $5 adults, $4 seniors and juniors (11-16), children 11 and under free.

LAWRENCE HALL OF SCIENCE -- "NanoZone," Discover the science of the super-small: nanotechnology. Through hands-on activities and games, explore this microworld and the scientific discoveries made in this area.

BERKELEY PACIFIC FILM ARCHIVE -- Exploring cinema from the Bay Area and cultures around the world, the Pacific Film Archive offers daily film screenings, including rare and rediscovered prints of movie classics; new and historic works by world famous directors; restored silent films with live musical accompaniment; retrospectives; and new and experimental works. Check Web site for a full schedule of films.

"First Impressions: Free First Thursdays," first Thursday of every month. Special tours and movie presentations. Admission is free.

USS HORNET MUSEUM -- Come aboard this World War II aircraft carrier that has been converted into a floating museum. The Hornet, launched in 1943, is 899 feet long and 27 stories high. During World War II she was never hit by an enemy strike or plane and holds the Navy record for number of enemy planes shot down in a week. In 1969 the Hornet recovered the Apollo 11 space capsule containing the first men to walk on the moon, and later recovered Apollo 12. In 1991 the Hornet was designated a National Historic Landmark and is now docked at the same pier she sailed from in 1944. Today, visitors can tour the massive ship, view World War II-era warplanes and experience a simulated aircraft launch from the carrier's deck. Exhibits are being added on an ongoing basis. Allow two to three hours for a visit. Wear comfortable shoes and be prepared to climb steep stairs or ladders. Dress in layers as the ship can be cold. Arrive no later than 2 p.m. to sign up for the engine room and other docent-led tours. Children under age 12 are not allowed in the Engine Room or the Combat Information Center.

CASA PERALTA -- Once the home of descendants of the 19th-century Spanish soldier and Alameda County landowner Don Luis Maria Peralta, the 1821 adobe was remodeled in 1926 as a grand Spanish villa, using some of the original bricks. The casa features a beautiful Moorish exterior design and hand painted tiles imported from Spain, some of which tell the story of Don Quixote. The interior is furnished in 1920s decor. The house will be decorated for the holidays during the month of December. Call ahead to confirm hours.

"Dial 'M' for Murder,'' by Frederick Knott, through May 16, Saturday, 8 p.m.; Sunday, 2 p.m. San Leandro Players present the story of an ex-tennis star who plots to murder his wife.

DIABLO ACTORS ENSEMBLE THEATRE -- "Same Time Next Year," by Bernard Slade, April 30 through May 23, Thursday-Saturday, 8 p.m.; Sunday, 2 p.m. An accountant and a housewife meet at a Northern California inn once a year, despite the fact that they are both married to other people. $10-$25.

THE MARSH BERKELEY -- CLOSING -- "East 14: True Tales of a Reluctant Player," through May 8. "East 14th'' chronicles the true tale of a young man raised by his mother and ultra-strict stepfather. $20-$35.

MASQUERS PLAYHOUSE -- CLOSING -- "The Apple Tree," through May 1, Friday and Saturday, 8 p.m.; Sunday, 2 p.m. Play is based on "The Diary of Adam and Eve'' by Mark Twain, "The Lady or the Tiger?'' by Frank R. Stockton and "Passionella'' by Jules Feiffer. $20.

WILLOWS CABARET AT THE CAMPBELL THEATRE -- OPENING -- "You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown,'' May 3 through June 6. The Red Baron patrols the skies, the Doctor is in, and the "blankie'' is in jeopardy again. $14-$32.

"Music That Dances," May 8, 7:30 p.m. Program features works by Gianna Abondolo, Jacques Offenbach, Antonin Dvorak, Bela Bartok and Bohuslav Martinu. $5-$10.

2700 E. Leland Rd., Pittsburg.

SAINT MARY MAGDALEN CHURCH --

"Music for Lorenzo De' Medici and Maximilian I: Isaac's Missa 'La Bassadanza','' May 2, 5:30 p.m. MusicSources presents a liturgical reconstruction of this work with organ allternatim and plainchat for the Order of the Golden Fleece.

"Sacred and Profane Presents Madness and Mirth," May 7, 8 p.m. Program features works by Benjamin Britten, Per Norgard, Geoffredi Petrassi and William Bergsma. $15-$20. (415) 388-5899, www.scrdprofane.org.

"El Corazon de la Communidad: The Heart of the Community", Painted by Joaquin Alejandro Newman, this mural installation consists of four 11-foot panels that mix ancient Meso-American and contemporary imagery to pay homage to local activists Carmen Flores and Josie de la Cruz.

"Oakland's 19th-Century San Pablo Avenue Chinatown,'' A permanent exhibit of new findings about the rediscovered Chinatown on San Pablo Avenue. The exhibit aims to inform visitors about the upcoming archaeological work planned to explore the lives of early Chinese pioneers in the 1860s.

"Going Away, Coming Home," A 160-foot public art installation by Mills College art professor Hung Liu. Liu hand painted 80 red-crowned cranes onto 65 panels of glass that were then fired, tempered and paired with background panes that depict views of a satellite photograph, ranging from the western United States to the Asia Pacific Area. Terminal 2.

"Leroy Parker," through May 31. Exhibition features drawings, paintings and mixed media by the artist.

1001 Broadway, Oakland. (510) 451-4000.

RICHMOND ART CENTER --

"Cream From the Top," through June 5. Exhibition features surfacing talent from fine arts programs at California College of the Arts, Mills College, San Francisco Art Institute, San Francisco State University, University of California, Berkeley and University of California, Davis.

"Organ Recital with Cameron Carpenter," May 2, 6 p.m. Carpenter mixes muscianship with showmanship for an unforgettable performance of traditional repertoire as well as music from film scores, jazz and disco. (415) 864-6000.

"Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 2,'' May 5 through May 8, Wednesday, 10 a.m. and 8 p.m.; Friday, 6:30 p.m.; Saturday, 8 p.m. Christoph Eschenbach conducts the San Francisco Symphony in a program that includes Beethoven, Larcher and Brahms. $15-$130.

"Chamber Music Series," May 9, 2 p.m. Program features works by Nathaniel Stookey, Stravinsky, Prokofiev and Ravel. $35.

The Berkeley Arts Festival will soon be in full swing, starting this weekend on Saturday with pianist Sarah Cahill at 8pm and continuing on Sunday at 8 pm with the Dazzling Divas ,Pamela Connelly, Kathleen Moss and Eliza O'Malley and pianist Hadley McCarroll,presenting favorites from the opera repertoire.

The Oakland Museum of California reopens the weekend of May 1-2, 2010 with a continuous 31-hour long stream of events. The main building has been closed for two years for extensive renovations and creation of what the museum calls a “re-imagined” exhibit program.

We’ll see what’s inside when the plywood comes off on the weekend.

Re-opening weekend, “Presented by Target”, is free.

Opening ceremonies start at 11 on Saturday the 1st at the Oak Street entrance. There will be a “Native American Ohlone blessing”, speeches by local dignitaries, “premiere of an aerial dance created for the opening” by Project Bandaloop.

That’s just the beginning. “Holistic Hooping”, a yo-yo exhibition, the San Francisco Lesbian/Gay Freedom Band, “Master whistler Sean Lomax”, hip-hop dance, square dancing, a palm-reader, “strolling acoustic musicians”, yoga, “community drumming”, face-painting, Oakland School for the Arts jazz, a “non-stop Bhangra Bollywood Dance Party”, the Capacitor Dance Company, and the Oakland Interfaith Gospel Choir, all have their place in the schedule that runs through day and night up until 6 pm on Sunday.

It sounds like a complete cultural carnival.

The museum publicity says “pajamas and sleepwear are encouraged”, for the 6 pm Saturday to 6 am Sunday period that is intended to have an “adult flavor”. Sunday is framed as “especially for family.”

There are also programs on “Oakland and the Fight for Food Justice” and “Radical Creativity”.

The 1969 Kevin Roche facility remains one of the best Modern buildings in the East Bay with its descending terraces, galleries, and gardens. Dan Kiley—with Berkeley landscape legend Geraldine Knight Scott—did the original grounds.

The San Francisco firm of Mark Cavagnero and Associates designed the remodel, which enclosed some of the outdoor spaces to create new indoor galleries. Fortunately, however, the Oakland Museum decided to renovate rather than feed the architectural past to the future, as was done with the De Young and the California Academy of Sciences facilities.

Of the permanent exhibit areas, only re-juggled art and human history sections will reopen this weekend. The natural history galleries are still closed, with 2012 projected as a reopening date. But there’s a “new expanded” store (of course there is—that’s the nature of the 21st century American museum) and a bigger and apparently upscaled on-site café.

I’m hopeful that the museum will retain a rich, interesting, and informative mix of permanent exhibits. This is an excellent regional museum, with a threefold focus on art, history, and the environment conceived in the 1960s. It also has a lot of Berkeley in it, because of the close proximity and connections of our two sibling towns.

The title of an early special exhibit—“PIXAR: 25 Years of Animation”, starting at the end of July—is not encouraging. Will this be one of those exhibits with a corporate hagiographic gloss, like the Kaiser show in 2004? (I wrote about that exhibit for the March 30, 2004 Planet). I hope not.

An exhibit planned for 2011 on “The Art of the Missions of Northern New Spain” sounds more historically encouraging.

Nine houses designed by Julia Morgan in the Claremont and Elmwood districts will be open on the Berkeley Architectural Heritage Association’s Spring House Tour, to take place Sunday, May 2, between 1 pm and 5 pm.

The tour, "Looking at Julia Morgan: Early Residences in Berkeley", will feature houses designed between 1904 and 1914.

Clad in brown shingles or in stucco, these early houses are expressions of the Arts & Crafts movement. The tour will showcase the variety of the architect’s designs within this idiom, as well as a later design in the Mediterranean style.

All the houses are within walking distance of each other, along an easy grade.

Tickets are $40 general and $30 for BAHA members. They are available for purchase on the BAHA website (http://berekleyheritage.com).

On the day of the tour, a ticket booth will be open from 12:30 pm to 4 pm in front of St. Clement’s Episcopal Church, 2837 Claremont Blvd.

Pre-tour lecture: Julia Morgan’s Cohorts

On Thursday, April 29, architectural historian Inge Horton will present an illustrated lecture entitled “Julia Morgan’s Cohorts” at the Hillside Club, 2286 Cedar Street, Berkeley. Ms. Horton is the author of the upcoming book Early Women Architects of the San Francisco Bay Area: The Lives and Work of Fifty Professionals, 1890–1950. The lecture will begin at 7:30 pm, and admission is $15 at the door.

Women of all walks of life and ages, whose lives may seem disconnected, have much in common: the constraints that bind them as well as their potential liberation. The freedom of each, this poster proposes, is bound up with the freedom of all.

The idea of “sisterhood” extends to women an appreciation of connection that receives expression in every culture. Using the masculine vocabulary of his time, John Donne wrote early in the 17th century:

“No man is an island, entire of itself...any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee."

Berkeley-Oakland Women’s Union, 1975

Women under capitalism must mrganize: demonstration 1975.

The Berkeley-Oakland Women’s Union was one among about twenty “women’s unions” that were founded across the country in the early 1970s,

This is one of four posters in a series that illustrates the ways in which women can work together to advance social and personal change.

The other three posters depict women involved in a consciousness raising group, in making leaflets on a mimeograph machine, and in pasting a poster to a wall.

Bruce Kaiper, 1975

Can’t wipe those blues

During World War II, many women took factory jobs. The independence that they experienced in the workplace helped to set the stage for 2nd-wave feminism, which got underway in the early 1960s.

Independence, though, was apt to raise profound questions about personal identity. In this image a metalworker sees her own reflection in a metal plate. That reflection is superimposed upon an additional image of a woman holding a child (whose head is visible next to the woman’s right hand) . Is she perhaps balancing representations of herself as metal worker and as mother?

Jane Norling, 1973

Women Health Workers Conference

Womens’ traditional roles in health care have been those of helpers, subservient to doctors.

But in the ‘60s and ‘70s women reclaimed authority over their own bodies, and reinterpreted the scope of medical care to encompass wide dimensions of physical and mental health and illness.

The book “Our Bodies, Ourselves” became a classic in a new literature about how women collectively and individually can look after their own health.

Men’s healthcare, too, was transformed to the degree that orthodox medical approaches learned from the new insights and practices that women developed

Artist unknown, 1975

West Coast Conference of Socialist-Feminist Organizations

This conference was sponsored by the Berkeley-Oakland Women’s Union. Like many of the women’s unions nationwide, this one was socialist, and joined issues of women’s liberation to issues of social class. Workers and women were regarded as have closely linked interests.

These unions grew rapidly but became as riven by competing ideological tendencies and allegiances as was the wider Left to which they belonged. As that Left declined in the late 1970s, they declined as well.

But what women had realized could not be so easily taken away. From women’s organizations came a generation of activists with organizing skills and understandings that in subsequent decades they put to good use in trade unions, schools, work places, government institutions, and their personal as well as political relationships.

The female nude in the poster invokes an early modern European anatomical illustration that unites sexuality and science.

In the 1970s, Barbara Ehrenreich and Deidre English published pamphlets and books critiquing the medical view of women, past and present.

In many cultures, women are regarded as passive and available objects of men’s attention. But Emma Goldman was anything but silent, and encouraged all women to make their voices heard and take control of their own lives.

Artist unknown, circa 1971

Free Angela & all political prisoners

Angela Davis is an African-American political activist, socialist, philosopher and retired UC Santa Cruz professor. She was a leader in the Civil Rights Movement and was associated with the Black Panthers.

Born and raised in Birmingham Alabama, Davis went to Brandeis University, then studied with Frankfurt School philosopher Herbert Marcuse in San Diego.

In 1970, a Superior Court judge was abducted from a California courtroom and murdered during an effort to free a convict. The firearms used in the attack were purchased in Davis's name. She was arrested and accused of being an accomplice to conspiracy, kidnapping, and homicide. In 1972, the jury returned a verdict of not guilty.

Doug Minkler, 1983

All of us or none

Like many modern artists, Minkler brings abstraction into his representations of the human figure. But his use of color and jagged form conveys an intensity and passion of commitment as powerful as that of any “realistic” portrayal.

Minkler: “My prints are inspired not by rugged individualism, but by the collective humor, defiance, and lust for life exhibited by those on the margins.”

How do we remember a social protest movement? Often by words that have been left behind: founding documents, manifestos, flyers, and the like. But visual artifacts can be powerful too: sometimes a movement’s images reveal its deepest character and commitments.

That’s the case for an exhibition of posters that is being shown at a café/coffee house called “Local 123” (www.local123gallery.com), named after a Painters’ Local union hall that previously occupied the space. The posters, all of which were created here in the Bay Area, will be on display through June 1.

The posters gathered for this exhibition come from various local collections, including Michael Rossman's "All Of Us Or None" archive. Rossman, who was a leader of the Free Speech Movement in 1964, a social activist, teacher, and historian, assembled this archive, which now consists of 24,000 posters. The entire collection is being donated to the Oakland Museum.

Made during the so-called “Second Wave” of feminism that began in the 1960s, these images express a Women’s Movement that aimed to shake the very foundations of society and culture, and still does. The posters represent a wide range of causes and experiences. They show women in diverse walks of life – as industrial workers and labor union organizers, as mothers, nurses, and guerilla fighters. This art subjects all of these roles to critical scrutiny: at issue are all the gender positions and relationships that shape the identities of men and women, influencing the ways in which we view ourselves and one another.

The Women’s Movement, here in the Bay Area and worldwide, developed in close relation with other movements of the time, including the anti-war and labor movements (hence the appropriateness of holding the exhibition at what used to be a union headquarters). In many cases we do not know the identities of the artists themselves; their posters were typically designed and created anonymously. Although the artists were often called upon to work quickly, under the pressure of the moment, they created works of beauty and meaning that remain compelling today.

I had already seen some of these posters in books, but what surprised me, upon viewing the original images in full-size, attractively displayed on the walls of this labor-oriented cafe, was how much more powerful they are in their original form than in reproductions. Hence I encourage Daily Planet readers to see the exhibition for themselves. It recreates a world of the past, but one whose issues and messages are quite contemporary.

A free lecture and slideshow about the exhibition will be given on May Day (Saturday, May 1) at 5 PM at the coffee house. The presenter will be archivist Lincoln Cushing, who together with Emma Spertus assembled the exhibition. Cushing, formerly a librarian at U.C. Berkeley's Bancroft Library and at the Institute of Industrial Relations, is a poster maker himself and has published four books about poster art. Spertus, too, is an artist.

Café Local 123 is located at 2049 San Pablo in Berkeley, a half a block South of University Ave., and is open Monday to Friday 6:30 am to 7:00 pm, Saturday and Sunday 7:00 AM to 7:00 PM. As of May 1, the café will be open until 10:30 PM on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday.

The Goddard houses at 2531 and 2535 Etna St. are two of three originally built on this site.

Daniella Thompson

Julia Morgan designed 2733 Ashby Place for the Goddards after completion of the Parker and Etna St. houses. This house will be open on the BAHA Julia Morgan House Tour on May 2.

Daniella Thompson

Julia Morgan designed 2816 Derby St. in 1908 as a rental income property for herself and Ira Hoover. The layout echoes that of 2733 Ashby Place. This house will be open on BAHA's House Tour, May 2.

Daniella Thompson

2814 Derby St., a mirror-image twin of its next-door neighbor, will be open on BAHA's House Tour, May 2.

Malcolm Goddard, D.D.S. in a passport photo on the eve of his move to France, March 1920.

Around the turn of the last century, it was common practice for middle-class or well-to-do families with adolescent children to move their residence to Berkeley in order to secure good education for their young. Among those was the household of Clark and Louise Goddard.

Clark La Motte Goddard, A.B., D.D.S., A.M., born 1849 in Beloit, Wisconsin, was Emeritus Professor of Orthodontia and former dean of the University of California’s College of Dentistry. His scholarship, analytical turn of mind, great mechanical ingenuity, and superior manipulative skill combined to make him one of the West Coast’s preeminent dentists.

In 1881, Dr. Goddard married Emily Louise Bunker, born 1857 in Barnard, Maine. Their union produced two children, Malcolm (b. 1883) and Florence (b. 1886). Great travelers, the Goddards took their children to Europe and kept a motorcar for trips around California. Dr. Goddard was an accomplished amateur photographer; his collection of over 1,100 prints and negatives is housed at the Bancroft Library on the UC campus.

About 1902, the Goddards moved from Oakland to Berkeley, where Malcolm enrolled at the University of California and Florence entered Miss Head’s School.

For a couple of years, the family lived in a rented house on Hillside Avenue near Dwight Way. In 1904, they built their own house at 2647 Dwight Way. The architect was Oakland-based D. Franklin Oliver, who was building the First Congregational Church of Alameda at the same time. Two years later, Oliver would design the six-story Breuner Furniture Company building at 13th and Franklin, now part of the Oakland Tribune Tower.

The Goddard house survived into the mid-1950s, converted into seven apartments before being razed to make way for UC’s Unit 2 student residence halls.

On March 30, 1905, Dr. Goddard dropped dead on the sidewalk in front of the San Francisco ferry building while waiting for the boat to Berkeley. He was 55 years old. Goddard left an estate valued at $122,000, of which about $80,000 were out on loan to many individuals.

Almost immediately after her husband’s death, Louise Goddard began investing in real estate. In May 1905, she acquired lots on Parker and Etna streets and proceeded to build three shingled two-story houses at each location. Julia Morgan designed at least five and possibly all six of these houses.

The architect was then at the beginning of her long and prolific career. The first woman to study architecture at the prestigious École des Beaux-Arts in Paris, Julia Morgan returned to the Bay Area in 1902. Almost immediately, she opened her own practice out of her parents’ home, taking on private clients even as she assisted John Galen Howard with major UC projects such as the Hearst Greek Theatre and the Hearst Memorial Mining Building.

Morgan obtained her state architect’s license in March 1904 and opened an office in San Francisco. By then, she had already designed El Campanil on the Mills College campus, and within two years she would take charge of reconstructing the Fairmont Hotel on Nob Hill. During her 45-year career, Julia Morgan would design over 700 private and public buildings, most of them completed.

How Louise Goddard came to know Julia Morgan is not clear, but the connection was likely to have come about through the vast women’s network - including clubs and sororities — through which many of the architect’s commissions were funneled.

In December 1905, while the houses on Parker and Etna streets were under construction, Louise, Malcolm, and Florence Goddard purchased three lots on Elmwood Avenue (now Ashby Place). In 1907, Mrs. Goddard commissioned Julia Morgan to design a speculative house on the westernmost lot.

The first five or six houses Morgan designed for the Goddards were relatively modest and clad in redwood. The new house was more substantial, costlier ($4,500 vs. $2,900), and the only one clad in stucco, a material just coming into popular use in Berkeley.

The first tenant at 2733 Ashby Place was George G. Towle, the son of lumber baron Allen Towle, who owned the town of Towle near Dutch Flat in Placer County and had diverse business interests, including lumber, logging, sawmills, crate manufacturing, mining, pulp mills, narrow-gauge railroads, and vast landholdings.

George managed the Towle Estate Company. His daughter, Katherine, who grew up to become the University of California’s Dean of Women, reminisced about those days: “I’m quite certain the family’s decision to move [from Oakland] was because of the schools, and Berkeley was then a very attractive place to live. We rented a house on what was then called Elmwood Avenue. It’s now Ashby Place. You know, it’s down there off College Avenue. Those were just nothing but fields, you know. There were a few houses, ours among them.”

On narrow lots, Julia Morgan liked to position the entrance halfway down the side of the house, so the hall and stairwell were centrally located for easy access to all rooms. The Goddard house at 2733 Ashby Place is a good example of this design principle. The architect would recreate its floor plans on a slightly smaller scale in two shingled rental houses she and her partner, Ira Hoover, built at 2814 and 2816 Derby Street in 1909. All three houses will be open on Sunday, May 2, during the Berkeley Architectural Heritage Association’s annual Spring House Tour, devoted this year to Julia Morgan’s early residential work in the Claremont and Elmwood districts.

The Goddards continued to live at 2647 Dwight Way until Florence married Justin Warren McKibben in late 1910 and set up housekeeping at 15 Alvarado Road. Louise and Malcolm, the latter now a dentist, let the Dwight Way house and took up temporary residence in the Hotel Carlton on Telegraph Avenue.

In 1914, when the McKibbens built a new house at 2522 Piedmont Avenue, they called Harris C. Allen, not Julia Morgan, to design it. Malcolm Goddard also looked elsewhere for his proposed residence in Walnut Creek. The first architectural presentation for that house was made in 1914 by Irving F. Morrow. For some reason, Morrow’s design was not executed, and Julia Morgan ended up working on the same project a year later.

Engaged to a young society woman since 1912, Malcolm mysteriously remained single, his much publicized and long-awaited 1913 nuptials having fallen through without so much as a murmur in the press. He maintained a private practice in San Francisco, taught Comparative Anatomy and Odontology at the UC College of Dentistry, and was active in the Association of Allied Dental Societies. While waiting for his Walnut Creek house to be completed, he resided at one of his mother’s Parker Street houses.

An enthusiastic mountain climber, Malcolm utilized his expeditions for scientific exploration. In 1903, he participated in a paleontological expedition to Southern Idaho and later published the paper “Fish Remains from the Marine Lower Triassic of Aspen Ridge, Idaho” in the University of California’s Bulletin of the Department of Geology. In July 1912, he was the first person to ascend and survey several mountains around Lake Chilko in British Columbia. He named one of those peaks Mount Merriam, after Professor John C. Merriam, the UC paleontologist. Another peak was later named Mount Goddard in his honor.

In 1917, after the United States entered World War I, Malcolm enlisted in the Army’s Dental Corps and was shipped to France, where he served as a dental surgeon in base and field hospitals in the Auvergne and in Paris. Promoted to the rank of Captain, he was mustered out in September 1919.

Meanwhile, Louise Goddard had established residence in one of her Julia Morgan-designed houses on Etna Street. After returning from Europe, Malcolm lived with her for a few months, but in early 1920 he surprised his friends by announcing that he would be returning to Paris to make his home there. He was by no means the only UC Dental College graduate practicing abroad. In 1931, the Oakland Tribune named 45 men trained in this school who were practicing in other countries, including three in Paris.

Paris in the 1920s was the world’s most dazzling metropolis, enticing thousands of American musicians, artists, and writers. Malcolm Goddard had for society an illustrious circle of expatriates and visitors. In 1927, he was a guest at the Paris wedding of a Berkeley couple: Samuel J. Hume, notable theatrical director and scholar, and Portia Bell, then studying sculpture and later a well-known psychiatrist. Also present at the wedding were Mr. and Mrs. Robert Gordon Sproul, who were traveling through Europe.

In the spring of 1921, Louise Goddard sailed to France for a prolonged visit with her son. She died on Dec. 29, 1921, two months after her return to Berkeley.

While Florence Goddard McKibben lived on Piedmont Avenue and raised four children, her brother Malcolm persisted in his peripatetic life. In 1925, he went on safari in the French Cameroons, followed by a 1929–30 safari in French Sudan. In 1931, he retired from dentistry and moved to Buea, British Cameroons, establishing a ranch where he crossed the native Nigerian cattle with European stock.

Malcolm continued his scientific expeditions, sailing to the Gulf of Guinea and exploring the mouth of the Niger River. When the Straus West African Expedition of the Chicago Natural History Museum spent a month in the summer of 1934 collecting birds on Mount Cameroon, Dr. Goddard, now married, donated three specimens.

In the summer of 1938, Malcolm Goddard placed his 24-foot motor sail boat on board a banana boat for Hamburg and sailed alone through the Kiel Canal and along the fjords to Oslo. He had planned to continue sailing to the North Cape, but a heart attack felled him on August 24. Like his father, Malcolm was 55 at the time of his death. He was buried alongside the Goddards and the McKibbens in Plot 15 of Mountain View Cemetery, Oakland.

Of all the Goddards, Florence was the longest-lived. She passed away in 1958, a year after Julia Morgan’s death.

BAHA’s Julia Morgan House Tour will take place on Sunday, May 2, from 1 to 5 pm. For further information and tickets, visit http://berkeleyheritage.com.

AFRICAN AMERICAN MUSEUM AND LIBRARY AT OAKLAND -- The Oakland Public Library's museum is designed to discover, preserve, interpret and share the cultural and historical experiences of African Americans in California and the West. In addition, a three-panel mural is on permanent display.

ALAMEDA MUSEUM -- The museum offers permanent displays of Alameda history, the only rotating gallery showcasing local Alameda artists and student artwork, as well as souvenirs, books and videos about the rich history of the Island City.

BADE MUSEUM AT THE PACIFIC SCHOOL OF RELIGION -- The museum's collections include the Tell en-Nasbeh Collection, consisting of artifacts excavated from Tell en-Nasbeh in Palestine in 1926 and 1935 by William Badh, and the Howell Bible Collection, featuring approximately 300 rare books (primarily Bibles) dating from the 15th through the 18th centuries.

"Tell en-Nasbeh," This exhibit is the "heart and soul" of the Bade Museum. It displays a wealth of finds from the excavations at Tell en-Nasbeh, Palestine whose objects span from the Early Bronze Age (3100-2200 BC) through the Iron Age (1200-586 BC) and into the Roman and Hellenistic periods. Highlights of the exhibit include "Tools of the Trade" featuring real archaeological tools used by Badh and his team, an oil lamp typology, a Second Temple period (586 BC-70 AD) limestone ossuary, and a selection of painted Greek pottery.

"William Frederic Bade: Theologian, Naturalist, and Archaeologist," This exhibit highlights one of PSR's premier educators and innovative scholars. The collection of material on display was chosen with the hopes of representing the truly dynamic and multifaceted character of William F. Badh. He was a family man, a dedicated teacher, a loving friend, and an innovative and passionate archaeologist.

"French Film Posters from the BAM/PFA Collection," through May 31. Part of the Pacific Film Archive's collection of over eight thousand international film posters, these rare prints were bequeathed to BAM/PFA by the late Mel Novikoff, founder of San Francisco's first repertory cinema chain, Surf Theaters, which included the Surf, the Lumiere, and the Castro. Novikoff collected these posters during many trips to Europe, and for years they graced the lobbies of cinemas in the Surf chain. Now they can be enjoyed in the museum's Theater Gallery, where admission is free.

"Thom Faulders: BAMscape," through Nov. 30. This commissioned work, a hybrid of sculpture, furniture, and stage, is the new centerpiece of Gallery B, BAM's expansive central atrium. It is part of a new vision of the gallery as a space for interaction, performance, and improvised experiences.

"Nature into Action: Hans Hofmann," through June 30. This installation drawn from BAM's extensive Hans Hofmann collection reveals the relationship between nature as source and action as method in the great abstract painter's work.

"James Buckhouse: Serg Riva," through May 31. Welcome to the world of Serg Riva, self-declared "aquatic couturier,'' enfant terrible, and man about town"-and sly fictive creation of artist James Buckhouse.

"Assignment Shanghai: Photographs on the Eve of Revolution," through May 9. In 1946, Life magazine assigned the young photographer Jack Birns to Shanghai with instructions to document the ongoing Chinese civil war. This selection of the resulting photographs, drawn from the BAM collection, vividly captures a cosmopolitan city in the midst of social and political change.

"Realm of Enlightenment: Masters and Teachers from the Land of Snows," through May 16. A new installation of extraordinary objects from Tibet explores the role of the teacher and master in the transmission of the Buddhist canon.

"What's It All Mean: William T. Wiley in Retrospect,'' through July 18. This retrospective surveys the witty, idiosyncratic, and introspective work of William T. Wiley, a beloved Bay Area artist and "a national treasure'' (Wall Street Journal). Layered with ambiguous ideas and allusions, autobiographical narrative and sociopolitical commentary, Wiley's art is rich in self-deprecating humor and absurdist insight.

"Perpetual and furious refrain / MATRIX 232," May 2 through Sept. 12. Exhibition features works by Brent Green.

"Beyond Blastoff: Surviving in Space," An interactive exhibit that allows you to immerse yourself into the life of an astronaut to experience the mixture of exhilaration, adventure and confinement that is living and working in space.

"Chabot Observatories: A View to the Stars," Explore the history of the Chabot observatories and how its historic telescopes are used today. Daytime visitors can virtually operate a telescope, experiment with mirrors and lenses to understand how telescopes create images of distant objects and travel through more than a century of Chabot's history via multimedia kiosks, historical images and artifact displays.

EVENTS -- CLOSED FOR MAINTENANCE: SEPT. 2-16.

"Galaxy Explorers Hands-On Fun," Saturday, noon-4 p.m. The Galaxy Explorers lead a variety of fun, hands-on activities, such as examining real spacesuits, creating galaxy flipbooks, learning about telescopes, minerals and skulls and making your own comet. Free with general admission.

"Daytime Telescope Viewing," Saturday and Sunday, 11 a.m.-5 p.m. View the sun, the moon and the planets through the telescopes during the day. Free with general admission.

ASIAN ART MUSEUM OF SAN FRANCISCO -- The Asian Art Museum-Chon-Moon Lee Center for Asian Art and Culture recently unveiled its new building in San Francisco's Civic Center. The building, the former San Francisco Public Library, has been completely retrofitted and rebuilt to house San Francisco's significant collection of Asian treasures. The museum offers complimentary audio tours of the museum's collection galleries.

ONGOING EXHIBIT --

"In a New Light," There are some 2,500 works displayed in the museum's new galleries. They cover all the major cultures of Asia and include Indian stone sculptures, intricately carved Chinese jades, Korean paintings, Tibetan thanksgas, Cambodian Buddhas, Islamic manuscripts and Japanese basketry and kimonos.

ONGOING FAMILY PROGRAMS --

Storytelling, Sundays and the first Saturday of every month, 1 p.m. This event is for children of all ages to enjoy a re-telling of Asian myths and folktales in the galleries. Meet at the Information Desk on the Ground Floor. Free with general admission.

"Target Tuesday Family Program," first Tuesday of every month. Free with general admission.

"Family Art Encounter," first Saturday of every month, 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. Drop in to make art related to the museum's collection. Children must be accompanied by an adult. In the Education Studios. Free with admission.

DOCENT-LED ART TOURS -- The museum's docents offer two types of tours: a general introduction to the museum's collection and a highlight tour of specific areas of the collection. Free with museum admission.

ARCHITECTURAL GUIDES -- Tuesday through Sunday at noon and 2:30 p.m., Thursday at 6:30 p.m. Learn about the former Main Library's transformation into the Asian Art Museum on this 40-minute tour. Free with museum admission.

"Shanghai," through Sept. 5. Exhibition features more than 130 artworks including oil paintings, Shanghai Deco furniture, revolutionary posters, works of fashion and more.

$7-$12; free children under age 12; $5 Thursday after 5 p.m.; free to all first Sunday of each month. Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday through Sunday, 10 a.m.-5 p.m.; Thursday, 10 a.m.-9 p.m. 200 Larkin St., San Francisco. (415) 581-3500, www.asianart.org.

BEAT MUSEUM -- Formerly located on the California coast in Monterey, the Beat Museum now sits in historic North Beach. The Museum uses letters, magazines, pictures, first editions and more to explore the lives of leading beat figures such as Jack Kerouac, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Allen Ginsberg, Neal Cassady and many others. A gift shop and bookstore are open to the public free of charge.

SPECIAL EVENTS --

"North Beach Walking Tour,", A 90-minute walking tour of North Beach with Beat Museum curator Jerry Cimimo. See the bars, coffeehouses, homes, and other Beat-related highlights of North Beach. Call for info. $15.

CABLE CAR MUSEUM -- The museum is located in the historic Cable Car Barn and Powerhouse. Visitors can see the actual cable winding machinery, grips, track, cable and brakes, as well as three historic cable cars, photo displays and mechanical artifacts. The best way to get to this museum is by cable car; street parking is practically non-existent.

"Nightlife," Thursdays, 6 p.m. Every Thursday night, the Academy transforms into a lively venue filled with provocative science, music, mingling and cocktails, as visitors get a chance to explore the museum.

"Where the Land Meets the Sea," Exhibition features sculpture by Maya Lin.

HISTORY WALKABOUTS -- A series of monthly walking tours that explore the history, lore and architecture of California with veteran tour guide Gary Holloway. Walks take place rain or shine so dress for the weather. Reservations and prepayment required. Meeting place will be given with confirmation of tour reservation. Tour price includes admission to the Museum.

MUSEUM -- The museum's permanent collection is made up of the Fine Arts Collection, consisting of 5,000 works of art that represent the history of California from pre-Gold Rush days to the early decade of the 20th century; and The Photography Collection, containing nearly a halfmillion images in an array of photographic formats documenting the history of California in both the 19th and 20th centuries. The Library and Research Collection contain material relating to the history of California and the West from early exploration time to the present including texts, maps, and manuscripts.

"Landscape and Vision: Early California Painters from the Collections of the California Historical Society," open-ended. An exhibit of oil paintings including a large number of early landscapes of California, from the museum's collection.

"Extreme Mammals," through Sept. 12. Exhibition explores mammals, from the towering to the tiny.

"California Nights -- Cinco de Mayo," May 5, 6-8 p.m. Celebrate this Mexican holiday with refreshments, a live DJ and the museums current exhibit, "Think California.''

"An Exploration of Cartoon Art," This exhibit explores the history of cartoon art including works from the most renowned and creative cartoonists of the last century. The exhibit traces the evolution of cartooning through its many forms including animation, comic strips, comic books, editorial cartoons and underground cartoons.

CARTOONING CLASSES FOR KIDS -- Saturday, 1 p.m. to 3 p.m. For children ages 6 to 14. Call for schedule. Free with admission.

CLOSING -- "Drawing the Sword: Samuari in Manga and Anime," through May 2. Exhibition explores the complex evolution of Japanese artistic traditions by demonstrating the ever-changing image of the iconic samurai.

"Small Press Spotlight on Jamaica Dyer," through June 13. Exhibition features works by the Santa Cruz artist.

OPENING -- "60 Years of Beetle Bailey," May 8 through Sept. 19. Exhibition showcases the comics of Mort Walker.

CHINESE HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF AMERICA -- The CHSA Museum and Learning Center features a permanent exhibition, "The Chinese of America: Toward a More Perfect Union'' in its Main Gallery, and works by Chinese-American visual artists in its Rotating Galleries.

ONGOING EXHIBIT --

"Leaders of the Band," An exhibition of the history and development of the Cathay Club Marching Band, the first Chinese American band formed in 1911.

CONTEMPORARY JEWISH MUSEUM -- The museum, formerly known as the Jewish Museum San Francisco, has a new addition designed by Daniel Libeskind and is dedicated to exploring the richness and diversity of Jewish thought and culture.

GALLERY TOURS -- Sunday and Wednesday, 12:30 p.m. Free.

"As It Is Written: Project 304,805," through Oct. 3. Exhibition centers around a soferet (a professionally trained female scribe) who writes out the entire text of the Torah, at the Museum, over the course of a full year. She will be one of the few known women to complete an entire Torah scroll, an accomplishment traditionally exclusive to men.

"Our Struggle: Responding to Mein Kampf," through June 15. Linda Elia presents a a host of artists' page-by-page response to Hitler's notorious memoir and manifesto.

DE YOUNG MUSEUM -- The art museum has now reopened in a new facility designed by Swiss architecture firm Herzog and de Meuron and Fong and Chan Architects in San Francisco. It features significant collections of American art from the 17th through the 20th centuries; modern and contemporary art; art from Central and South America, the Pacific and Africa; and an important and diverse collection of textiles.

ARTIST STUDIO PROGRAM -- Wednesday-Sunday, 1-5 p.m. A monthly interactive program during which the public can meet and work with a featured artist. Demonstrations take place in the Kimball Education Gallery, which does not require paid admission. (415) 750-7634.

LECTURES BY DOCENTS -- These lectures are free and are held in the Koret Auditorium unless otherwise noted.

SPECIAL EVENTS --

"Friday Nights at the de Young: Cultural Encounters," 5-8:45 p.m. The de Young stays open until 8:45 p.m. each Friday night and hosts special events including live music, dance, film, lectures and artist demonstrations.

Aug. 22: "Cultural Encounters presents Hot Brazilian Nights.''

Event features music by Forro for All and art-making for the entire family.

Aug. 29: "Cultural Encounters.''

Event features live music by the Scott Amendola Trio. Free with admission.

"Poetry Series," 7-8:30 p.m. $8-$12. (415) 750-7634.

"Tutankhamun and the Golden Age of the Pharaohs," through May 28. More than 3,000 years after his reign, and 30 years after the original exhibition opened in San Francisco, Tutankhamun, ancient Egypt's celebrated "boy king," returns to the de Young Museum. In the summer of 2009 the de Young presents Tutankhamun and the Golden Age of the Pharaohs, a glorious exhibition of over 130 outstanding works from the tomb of Tutankhamun, as well as those of his royal predecessors, his family, and court officials. Tutankhamun and the Golden Age of the Pharaohs includes many new and exciting elements not seen in previous versions of the exhibition, including a revised version of the catalogue, a new audio tour, and additional artifacts from Tutankhamun's tomb.

"Amish Abstractions: Quilts from the Collection of Faith and Stephen Brown," through June 6. This exhibition features approximately 48 fullsize and crib quilts dating from the 1880s to the 1940s. Quilts made by girls and women of various Amish communities in Pennsylvania and the Midwest are visual distillations of their way of life. The Amish faith embodies the principles of simplicity, humility, discipline, and community, but their quilts are anything but humble. Using a rich color palette and bold patterns, these quilts are truly a unique contribution to American textile history. The quilts highlight the beauty and complexity of the abstract patterns.

"I Keep Foolin' Around: William T. Wiley as Printmaker,'' through July 4. Exhibition features paintings, sculpture and more by Bay Area artist Wiley.

LEGION OF HONOR MUSEUM -- DOCENT TOUR PROGRAMS -- Tours of the permanent collections and special exhibitions are offered Tuesday through Sunday. Non-English language tours (Italian, French, Spanish and Russian) are available on different Saturdays of the month at 11:30 a.m. Free with regular museum admission. (415) 750-3638.

ONGOING CHILDREN'S PROGRAM --

"Doing and Viewing Art," For ages 7 to 12. Docent-led tours of current exhibitions are followed by studio workshops taught by professional artists/teachers. Students learn about art by seeing and making it. Saturday, 10:30 a.m. to noon; call to confirm class. Free with museum admission. (415) 750-3658.

THE MEXICAN MUSEUM GALLERIES AT FORT MASON CENTER ARE CURRENTLY CLOSED --

The Mexican Museum holds a unique collection of 12,000 objects representing thousands of years of Mexican history and culture within the Americas. The permanent collection, the Museum's most important asset and resource, includes five collecting areas: Pre-Conquest, Colonial, Popular, Modern and Contemporary Mexican and Latino, and Chicano Art. The Museum also has a collection of rare books and a growing collection of Latin American art.

MUSEO ITALOAMERICANO -- The museum, dedicated to the exhibition of art works by Italian and Italian-American artists, has a small permanent collection of paintings, sculptures, photographs and works on paper by such renowned artists as Beniamino Buffano, Sandro Chia, Giorgio de Chirico and Arnaldo Pomodoro.

DOCENT TOURS -- Wednesdays, 1 p.m. to 3 p.m. Free.

$2-$3; free children under age 12; free to all first Wednesday of the month. Wednesday-Sunday, noon -4 p.m.; first Wednesday of the month, noon-7 p.m. Fort Mason Center, Building C, Buchanan Street and Marina Boulevard, San Francisco. (415) 673-2200, www.museoitaloamericano.org.

MUSEUM OF CRAFT AND FOLK ART -- The museum, now open at a new downtown location, features craft and folk art from various cultures, both past and present, and includes styles ranging from utilitarian objects to contemporary art.

CLOSING -- "Rhythm and Hues: Cloth and Culture of Mali," through May 2. Mali's extraordinary legacy of textile arts, with its vibrant colors and complex graphic statements are presented.

MUSEUM OF THE AFRICAN DIASPORA -- A new museum exploring and celebrating the influence of the African Diaspora on global art and culture through interactive, permanent and changing exhibits and special programs. The museum occupies the first three floors of the new St. Regis Hotel at Third and Mission streets.

"Urban Kidz Film Series," Noon-3 p.m. An offshoot of the San Francisco Black Film Festival, featuring a striking assemblage of short and feature films designed to spark the imaginations of the 5-to-12-year-old set. $10 adults; children free. (415) 771-9271.

NATIONAL MARITIME MUSEUM LIBRARY (THE J. PORTER SHAW MARITIME LIBRARY) -- Closed on federal holidays. The library, part of the San Francisco Maritime National Historic Park, focuses on sail and steam ships on the West Coast and the Pacific Basin from 1520 to the present. The museum library holdings include a premiere collection of maritime history: books, magazines, oral histories, ships' plans and the San Francisco Maritime National Historical Park's 250,000 photographs.

Free. By appointment only, Monday-Friday, 1-4 p.m., and the third Saturday of each month. Fort Mason Center, Building E, Third Floor, Buchanan Street and Marina Boulevard, San Francisco. (415) 560-7080, (415) 560-7030, www.nps.gov/safr/local/lib/libtop.html.

PACIFIC HERITAGE MUSEUM -- The museum presents rotating exhibits highlighting historical, artistic, cultural and economic achievements from both sides of the Pacific Rim. The museum features a permanent display documenting the history and significance of the Branch Mint and Subtreasury buildings.

"Earthquake Exhibit," Learn about plate tectonics. Make a small quake by jumping on the floor to make a "floor quake'' that registers on the seismometer in the lobby. See the basement seismometer that registers quakes around the world. Walk through a full-size earthquake refugee shack that was used to house San Franciscans after the 1906 earthquake that destroyed so many homes.

"Creativity and Discovery Hand in Hand," A photography exhibit that gives visitors a look into the wide variety of programs the Museum offers in the way of classes, workshops, school field trips, and special interest clubs.

"Toddler Treehouse," Toddlers may comfortably climb the carpeted "treehouse'' and make a myriad of discoveries, from the roots to the limbs.

"Live Animal Exhibit," Visit with more than 100 creatures including small mammals, amphibians, reptiles, raptors and small birds, insects, spiders and tide pool creatures.

ONGOING EVENTS --

"Saturdays Are Special at the Museum," Saturdays, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. A series of drop-in ceramics and art and science workshops. All ages are welcome, though an adult must accompany children under age 8. $3 per child, $5 per parent-child combination.

"Bufano Sculpture Tours," first and third Saturdays of the month, 10:15 a.m. A tour of the giant animal sculptures of Beniamino Bufano. The sculptures were carved out of stone in the 1930s and include a giant cat and a mother bear nursing her cubs.

"Animal Room," Visit some of the animals that live at the museum, including reptiles, raptors, tide pool creatures and small mammals.

"Meet the Animals" Saturdays, 11:15 a.m. to noon. See the Randall's animals close-up and in person.

"Animal Feeding," Saturdays, noon. Watch the animals take their meals.

"Golden Gate Model Railroad Exhibit," Saturdays, 11 a.m. to 4 p.m.

DROP-IN ART AND SCIENCE WORKSHOPS -- 1-4 p.m. $3-$5.

SPECIAL EVENTS --

"Film Series for Teenagers," Fridays, 7 p.m.

"Drop-in Family Ceramics Workshop," Saturday, 10:15-11:15 a.m. $5.

"Third Friday Birders," 8 a.m. The hike through Corona Heights Park allows participants to enjoy the early morning views and learn more about the feathered inhabitants of the area. Children aged 10 and older if accompanied by adult.

"Golden Gate Model Railroad Exhibit," Saturday, 11 a.m.-4 p.m.

"Meet the Animals," 11:15 a.m.-noon.

"Animal Feeding," Saturday, noon.

"Drop-in Family Ceramics Workshop," Saturday, 1:15-2:15 p.m.

"Meet the Animals," Saturdays, 11:15 a.m. Learn about the animals that live at the Randall Museum.

SAN FRANCISCO CABLE CAR MUSEUM -- The museum is located in the historic Cable Car Barn and Powerhouse. Visitors can see the actual cable winding machinery, grips, track, cable and brakes, as well as three historic cable cars, photo displays and mechanical artifacts. The best way to get to this museum is by cable car; street parking is practically non-existent.

SAN FRANCISCO MARITIME NATIONAL HISTORICAL PARK -- One of only a few "floating'' national parks, the San Francisco Maritime National Historical Park includes four national landmark ships, a maritime museum, a maritime library and a World-War-II submarine named the USS Pampanito.

VISITOR CENTER -- Daily, 9:30 a.m.-5 p.m.

Entering the Pier is free but there is a fee to board the ships. The fee allows access to all ships and is good for seven days. $5; free children under age 16. May 28-Sept. 30: daily, 9:30 a.m.-7 p.m.; Oct. 1-May 27: Daily, 9:30 a.m.-5 p.m. Foot of Hyde Street, San Francisco. (415) 561-7100, www.nps.gov.

SAN FRANCISCO MUSEUM OF CRAFT AND DESIGN -- A museum celebrating and promoting the art of contemporary craft and design. The museum showcases diverse exhibitions from regional, national and international artists, working in mediums such as wood, clay, fiber, metal and glass.

EVENTS --

"Designers on Jewelry," through May 16. More than 70 pieces of jewelry created by 51 internationally-renowned designers offer an imaginitive, thought-provoking and sometime shumorous vision of contemporary jewelry.

"Matisse and Beyond: The Painting and Sculpture Collection," This newly reconceived exhibition of SFMOMA's modern art collection features paintings, sculptures and works on paper from the first 60 years of the 20th century. Featured artists include: Joseph Cornell, Ellsworth Kelly, Yves Klein, Salvador Dali, Frida Kahlo, Piet Mondrian, Pablo Picasso, Diego Rivera, Andy Warhol and Paul Klee.

"Between Art and Life: The Contemporary Painting and Sculpture Collection," This new presentation of the SFMOMA collection features works from the past five decades by Louise Bourgeois, Robert Gober, Eva Hesse, Anish Kapoor, Sherrie Levine, Brice Marden, Gordon Matta-Clark, Barry McGee, Bruce Nauman, Robert Rauschenberg and Kara Walker.

"The Art of Design: Selections from the Permanent Collection of Architecture and Design," The exhibit will feature 100 selections from their architecture, graphic design and industrial design collections on a rotating basis. It features classic works plus new designs by up-andcoming artists.

"Picturing Modernity: Photographs from the Permanent Collection," Photography is possibly the quintessential modern art medium because its 160-year history corresponds almost exactly with Modernism's duration as a cultural movement. This exhibit looks at the photograph's unique pictorial ability and its ever-growing pervasiveness in modern culture, putting the medium in dialogue with paintings and other kinds of art.

KORET VISITOR EDUCATION CENTER -- This facility includes multimedia display technology, "Pick Up and Go'' guides for adults and children, art videos, and a community art gallery created by participants in school, teen and family programs. Thursday, 6 p.m. to 8:30 p.m.; Friday and Saturday, 11 a.m. to 5:30 p.m.

SPECIAL EVENTS --

"Tony Labat's I Want You,'' The latest installment in the newly launched program series "Live Art at SFMOMA.'' The artist invites denizens of the Bay Area to make their own demands of the public which riffs on the iconic "I Want You'' army recruitment campaigns of World Wars I and II, he asks you what you would do if you had only one minute to seize the voice of authority, to be the finger-pointing Uncle Sam.

"Focus on Artists: Selections from the Collection," through May 23. This exhibition looks at SFMOMA's long-term relationships with several modern masters whose iconic works were influential in defining movements from Abstract Expressionism to Postminimalism and beyond.

"Dispatches from the Archives," through July 6. How does a museum best known for showing the work of others choose to publicly present itself?This presentation in the Koret Visitor Education Center showcases museumproduced ephemera, design pieces, and publications, while revealing the museum's long history of innovative programming and exhibitions. The materials are culled from SFMOMA's Library and Archives, which have recently processed and catalogued thousands of items spanning the museum's 75-year history. From exhibition posters and magazines to belt buckles and chocolate bars, the exhibition illustrates the story of an institution that cherishes the spirit of innovation.

"Ewan Gibbs: San Francisco," through June 27. This suite of drawings, commissioned by SFMOMA, offers an evocative glimpse of San Francisco's urban landscape and landmarks.

"Long Play," through May 23. In Bruce Conner's electric "THREE SCREEN RAY'' (2006), a new acquisition premiering in this exhibition, Ray Charles's 1959 hit song "What'd I Say'' is set to an ecstatic, frenzied collage -- nude women, bomb explosions, fireworks -- of original and preexisting imagery. A tour de force of experimental film techniques, the piece features Conner's manipulations of the film surface and his signature use of countdown leader. The work's central image is Conner's 1961 film "COSMIC RAY,'' which he adapted to three screens in 1965 and later reedited to create this gallery installation of three video projections.

"The View from Here," through June 27. Just as photography has been instrumental in shaping California's popular image, the state -- and San Francisco, in particular -- has played a key role in the history of photography as an art form.

CLOSING -- Luc Tuymans, through May 2. SF MOMA presents the first US retrospective of this Belgian artist.

$7-$12.50; half price on Thursdays after 6 p.m.; free for all visitors on the first Tuesday of every month. Monday, Tuesday and Friday through Sunday, 10 a.m.-5:45 p.m.; Thursday, 10 a.m.-8:45 p.m. 151 Third St., San Francisco. (415) 357-4000, www.sfmoma.org.

SAN FRANCISCO PERFORMING ARTS LIBRARY AND MUSEUM --

ONGOING EXHIBITS --

"Dance in California: 150 Years of Innovation," This permanent exhibit traces the history and artistic range of modern dance in California, with photographs and documents highlighting the achievements of Lola Montez, Isadora Duncan, Ruth St. Denis, Martha Graham, the Christensen brothers, the Peters Wright School, the company of Lester Horton, Anna Halprin and Lucas Hoving.

"Maestro! Photographic Portraits by Tom Zimberoff," This permanent exhibit is a comprehensive study of a generation of national and international conductors. In Gallery 5.

SEYMOUR PIONEER MUSEUM -- The museum, owned by The Society of California Pioneers, houses a permanent research library, art gallery and history museum. Exhibits include a photography collection documenting California history.

TREGANZA ANTHROPOLOGY MUSEUM AT SAN FRANCISCO STATE UNIVERSITY -- The museum, founded in 1968, houses collections of archaeological and ethnographic specimens from Africa, Oceania, Asia, and North America as well as small collections from Central and South America. There are also collections of photographs, tapes and phonograph records from Africa and Europe. In addition, there is an archive of field notes and other materials associated with the collections. The museum also houses the Hohenthal Gallery that is used for traveling exhibits as well as exhibits mounted by students and faculty.

ARDENWOOD HISTORIC FARM -- Ardenwood farm is a working farm that dates back to the time of the Patterson Ranch, a 19th-century estate with a mansion and Victorian Gardens. Today, the farm still practices farming techniques from the 1870s. Unless otherwise noted, programs are free with regular admission.

BAY AREA RAIL TRAILS -- A network of trails converted from unused railway corridors and developed by the Rails to Trails Conservancy.

BLACK DIAMOND MINES REGIONAL PRESERVE RAILROAD BED TRAIL -- This easy one mile long rail trail on Mount Diablo leads to many historic sites within the preserve. Suitable for walking, horseback riding, and mountain biking. Accessible year round but may be muddy during the rainy season. Enter from the Park Entrance Station parking lot on the East side of Somersville Road, Antioch.

IRON HORSE REGIONAL TRAIL -- The paved trail has grown into a 23 mile path between Concord and San Ramon with a link into Dublin. The trail runs from the north end of Monument Boulevard at Mohr Lane, east to Interstate 680, in Concord through Walnut Creek to just south of Village Green Park in San Ramon. It will eventually extend from Suisun Bay to Pleasanton and has been nominated as a Community Millennium Trail under the U.S. Millennium Trails program. A smooth shaded trail suitable for walkers, cyclists, skaters and strollers. It is also wheelchair accessible. Difficulty: easy to moderate in small chunks; hard if taken as a whole.

LAFAYETTE/MORAGA REGIONAL TRAIL -- A 7.65 mile paved trail converted from the Sacramento Northern Rail line. This 20-year old trail goes along Las Trampas Creek and parallels St. Mary's Road. Suitable for walkers, equestrians, and cyclists. Runs from Olympic Boulevard and Pleasant Hill Road in Lafayette to Moraga. The trail can be used year round.

OHLONE GREENWAY -- A 3.75-mile paved trail converted from the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe railway. Suitable for walkers, strollers and skaters. It is also wheelchair accessible. The trail runs under elevated BART tracks from Conlon and Key Streets in El Cerrito to Virginia and Acton Streets in Berkeley.

SHEPHERD CANYON TRAIL -- An easy 3-mile paved trail converted from the Sacramento Northern Rail Line. The tree-lined trail is gently sloping and generally follows Shepherd Canyon Road. Suitable for walkers and cyclists. It is also wheelchair accessible. Begins in Montclair Village behind McCaulou's Department Store on Medau Place and ends at Paso Robles Drive, Oakland. Useable year round.

BAY AREA RIDGE TRAIL -- The Bay Area Ridge Trail, when completed, will be a 400-mile regional trail system that will form a loop around the entire San Francisco Bay region, linking 75 public parks and open spaces to thousands of people and hundreds of communities. Hikes on portions of the trail are available through the Bay Area Ridge Trail Council. Call for meeting sites.

ONGOING EVENTS --

ALAMEDA COUNTY -- "Lake Chabot Bike Rides." These rides are for strong beginners and intermediates to build skill, strength and endurance at a non hammerhead pace. No one will be dropped. Reservations required. Distance: 14 miles. Elevation gain: 1,000 feet. Difficulty: beginner to intermediate. Pace: moderate. Meeting place: Lake Chabot Road at the main entrance to the park. Thursday, 6:15 a.m. (510) 468-3582.

BICYCLE TRAILS COUNCIL OF THE EAST BAY -- The Council sponsors trail work days, Youth Bike Adventure Rides, and Group Rides as well as Mountain Bike Basics classes which cover training and handling skills.

ONGOING EVENTS --

"Weekly Wednesday Ride at Lake Chabot," Wednesdays, 6:30 p.m. A 13- to 20-mile ride exploring the trails around Lake Chabot, with 1,500 to 2,000 feet of climbing. Meet at 6:15 p.m. in the parking lot across from the public safety offices at Lake Chabot in Castro Valley. Reservations requested. (510) 727-0613.

BLACK DIAMOND MINES REGIONAL PRESERVE -- Originally the home of several Native American tribes, white men began coal mining in the area in the 1860s. The preserve today features old mines and displays of the history of the area.

SPECIAL EVENTS --

"Time Traveling Trekkers," May 1, 9 a.m.-noon. Learn about the history of the park on a 2-mile strenuous hike.

"Prospect Tunnel Picnic," May 8, 9 a.m.-noon. Carpool to the eastern reaches of the park to take a trip underground to see late bloomers.

"Painting in the Park," May 9, 10-11:30 a.m. Gather various minerals and elemtns and turn them into art.

COYOTE HILLS REGIONAL PARK -- The park is located on the shoreline of Fremont Bay and features rich wetland areas as well as Ohlone Indian shellmound sites. Hiking in the park allows scenic views of San Francisco Bay and southern Alameda County. The 12-mile Alameda Creek Trail runs from the Bay east to the mouth of Niles Canyon and features an equestrian trail as well as a bicycle trail; hikers are welcome on both. The park conducts naturalist programs and has a visitor center with a nature store and Ohlone, natural history and wildlife exhibits.

SPECIAL EVENTS -- Free unless otherwise noted.

"Do Butterflies and Bees Have Knees," May 8, 10:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m. Observe these animals as they are absorbed with feeding.

"Lends on Wildlife: Tips and Tricks," May 9, 1-2:30 p.m. Join experienced photographers in the nectar garden to learn tips and tricks for capturing stunning photos of birds and butterflies.

"Focus on Wildlife: A Photo Exhibit," May 9, 10:30 a.m.-noon. View the best of Coyote Hills wildlife photographs.

CRAB COVE VISITOR CENTER -- At Crab Cove, you can see live underwater creatures and go into the San Francisco Bay from land. You can also travel back in time to Alameda's part. The goal is to increase understanding of the environmental importance of San Francisco Bay and the ocean ecosystem. Crab Cove's Indoor Aquarium and Exhibit Lab is one of the largest indoor aquariums in the East Bay.

SPECIAL EVENTS --

"Sea Siblings," Tuesdays, 9:30 a.m. and 11 a.m. Explore the natural world and take part in a theme related craft. Designed for the 3-5 year old learner. Registration is required. $4. (888) 327-2757.

"Catch of the Day," Sundays, 2-3 p.m. Drop by to find out more about the Bay and its wildlife through guided exploration and hands-on fun.

DUNSMUIR HOUSE AND GARDENS HISTORIC ESTATE -- Nestled in the Oakland hills, the 50-acre Dunsmuir House and Gardens estate includes the 37-room Neoclassical Revival Dunsmuir Mansion, built by coal and lumber baron Alexander Dunsmuir for his bride. Restored outbuildings set amid landscaped gardens surround the mansion.

ESTATE GROUNDS -- Self-Guided Grounds Tours are available yearround. The 50 acres of gardens and grounds at the mansion are open to the public for walking Tuesday-Friday, 9 a.m.-4 p.m. Booklets and maps of the grounds are available at the Dinkelspiel House. Free.

GUIDED TOURS -- Docent-led tours are available on the first Sunday of each month at 1 p.m. and 2 p.m. (except for July) and Wednesdays at 11 a.m. $5 adults, $4 seniors and juniors (11-16), children 11 and under free.

FIFTY-PLUS ADVENTURE WALKS AND RUNS -- The walks and runs are 3-mile round-trips, lasting about one hour on the trail. All levels of ability are welcome. The walks are brisk, however, and may include some uphill terrain. Events are held rain or shine and on all holidays except Christmas and the Fifty-Plus Annual Fitness Weekend. Call for dates, times and details.

FOREST HOME FARMS -- The 16-acre former farm of the Boone family is now a municipal historic park in San Ramon. It is located at the base of the East Bay Hills and is divided into two parts by Oak Creek. The Boone House is a 22-room Dutch colonial that has been remodeled several times since it was built in 1900. Also on the property are a barn built in the period from 1850 to 1860; the Victorian-style David Glass House, dating from the late 1860s to early 1870s; a storage structure for farm equipment and automobiles; and a walnut processing plant.

GREENBELT ALLIANCE OUTINGS -- A series of hikes, bike rides and events sponsored by Greenbelt Alliance, the Bay Area's non-profit land conservation and urban planning organization. Call for meeting places. Reservations required for all trips.

ALAMEDA COUNTY --

"Self-Guided Urban Outing: Berkeley," This interactive smart growth walking tour of central Berkeley examines some of the exciting projects that help alleviate the housing shortage in the city as well as amenities important to making a livable community. The walk, which includes the GAIA Cultural Center, Allston Oak Court, The Berkeley Bike Station, University Terrace and Strawberry Creek Park, takes between an hour-and-ahalf to two hours at a leisurely pace. Download the itinerary which gives specific directions by entering www.greeenbelt.org and clicking on "get involved'' and then "urban outings.'' Drop down and click on Berkeley. Free.

CONTRA COSTA COUNTY --

"Get to the Point," May 2, 10 a.m.-2 p.m. Explore the natural beauty and cultural history of Miller/Knox Regional Shoreline and Point Richmond.

HAYWARD REGIONAL SHORELINE -- With 1,682 acres of salt, fresh and brackish water marshes, seasonal wetlands and the approximately three-mile San Lorenzo Trail, the Hayward Shoreline restoration project is one of the largest of its kind on the West Coast, comprising 400 acres of marshland. Part of the East Bay Regional Park District.

HAYWARD SHORELINE INTERPRETIVE CENTER -- Perched on stilts above a salt marsh, the Center offers an introduction to the San Francisco Bay-Estuary. It features exhibits, programs and activities designed to inspire a sense of appreciation, respect and stewardship for the Bay, its inhabitants and the services they provide. The Habitat Room offers a preview of what may be seen outside. The 80-gallon Bay Tank contains some of the fish that live in the Bay's open waters, and the Channel Tank represents habitats formed by the maze of sloughs and creeks that snake through the marsh. The main room of the Center features rotating exhibits about area history, plants and wildlife. Part of the Hayward Area Recreation and Park District.

JOHN MUIR NATIONAL HISTORIC SITE -- The site preserves the 1882 Muir House, a 17-room Victorian mansion where naturalist John Muir lived from 1890 to his death in 1914. It was here that Muir wrote about preserving America's wilderness and helped create the national parks idea for the United States. The house is situated on a hill overlooking the City of Martinez and surrounded by nine acres of vineyards and orchards. Take a self-guided tour of this well-known Scottish naturalist's home. Also part of the site is the historic Martinez Adobe and Mount Wanda.

ONGOING EVENT --

Public Tours of the John Muir House, Begin with an eight-minute park film and then take the tour. The film runs every 15 minutes throughout the day. Wednesday through Friday, 2 p.m.; Saturday and Sunday, 1 p.m., 2 p.m. and 3 p.m.

MOUNT WANDA -- The mountain consists of 325 acres of grass and oak woodland historically owned by the Muir family. It offers a nature trail and several fire trails for hiking. Open daily, sunrise to sunset.

JOHN MUIR HOUSE, Tours of this well-known Scottish naturalist's home are available. The house, built in 1882, is a 14-room Victorian home situated on a hill overlooking the city of Martinez and surrounded by nine acres of vineyards and orchards. It was here that Muir wrote about preserving America's wilderness and helped create the national parks idea for the United States. The park also includes the historic Vicente Martinez Adobe, built in 1849. An eight-minute film about Muir and the site is shown every 15 minutes throughout the day at the Visitor Center. Self guided tours of the Muir home, the surrounding orchards, and the Martinez Adobe: Wednesday-Sunday, 1 a.m.-5 p.m. Public tours or the first floor of the Muir home: Wednesday-Friday, 2 p.m.; Saturday-Sunday, 2 p.m. and 3 p.m. Reservations not required except for large groups.

LINDSAY WILDLIFE MUSEUM -- This is the oldest and largest wildlife rehabilitation center in America, taking in 6,000 injured and orphaned animals yearly and returning 40 percent of them to the wild. The museum offers a wide range of educational programs using non-releasable wild animals to teach children and adults respect for the balance of nature. The museum includes a state-of-the art wildlife hospital which features a permanent exhibit, titled "Living with Nature,'' which houses 75 non-releasable wild animals in learning environments; a 5,000-square-foot Wildlife Hospital complete with treatment rooms, intensive care, quarantine and laboratory facilities; a 1-acre Nature Garden featuring the region's native landscaping and wildlife; and an "Especially For Children'' exhibit.

WILDLIFE HOSPITAL -- September-March: 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. The hospital is open daily including holidays to receive injured and orphaned animals. There is no charge for treatment of native wild animals and there are no public viewing areas in the hospital.

MARTIN LUTHER KING JR. SHORELINE -- This 1,200-acre park situated near Oakland International Airport offers picnic areas with barbecues and a boat launch ramp. Swimming is not allowed. The Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Grove, a group of trees surrounding a grassy glade, is at the intersection of Doolittle Drive and Swan Way. The area also includes the 50-acre Arrowhead Marsh (part of the Western Hemisphere Shorebird Reserve Network) and a Roger Berry sculpture titled "Duplex Cone,'' which traces the summer and winter solstice paths of the sun through the sky.

OAKLAND ZOO -- The zoo includes a Children's Petting Zoo, the Skyride, a miniature train, a carousel, picnic grounds and a gift shop as well as the animals in site specific exhibits, which allow them to roam freely. Included are "The African Savanna,'' with its two huge mixed-animal aviaries and 11 African Savanna exhibits; the Mahali Pa Tembo (Place of the Elephant), with giraffes, chimpanzees and more than 330 other animals from around the world; "Simba Pori,'' Swahili for "Lion Country,'' a spacious 1.5-acre habitat offering both a savanna and woodland setting for African lions; "Footprints from the Past,'' an anthropology exhibit showcasing four million years of human evolution and an actual "footpath'' of the first hominids to emerge from the African savanna; "Sun Bear Exhibit,'' a stateof-the-art space the zoo has developed for its two sun bears; and Siamang Island, a state-of-the-art, barrier-free area that emulates the gibbons' native tropical rain forest habitat. Also see the Malayan Fruit Bats from the Lubee Bat Conservancy in Florida that are now roosting in trees at the zoo. In addition there are special exhibits and events monthly.

"Endangered Species," An exhibit of photographs about the most endangered animals on the Earth and what can be done to save them. At the Education Center. Open daily during zoo hours. ONGOING EVENTS --

"Valley Children's Zoo,'' Daily, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. The three-acre attraction will offer a completely interactive experience for both children and adults. The exhibits include lemurs, giant fruit bats, otters, reptiles, insects and more. Free with regular Zoo admission.

"Wildlife Theater," Saturday, 11:45 a.m.; Sunday, 1:45 p.m. On Saturday mornings listen to a story and meet a live animal. On Sunday afternoon meet live animals and learn cool facts about them. Meet in the Lobby of the Zoo's Maddie's Center for Science and Environmental Education. Free with regular Zoo admission. (510) 632-9525, ext. 142.

PLEASANTON RIDGE REGIONAL PARK -- This 3,163-acre parkland is on the oak-covered ridge overlooking Pleasanton and the Livermore Valley from the west. A multi-purpose trail system accommodates hikers, equestrians and bicyclists.

POINT PINOLE REGIONAL SHORELINE -- The 2,315-acre parkland bordering Pinole, Richmond and San Pablo offers views of Mount Tamalpais, the Marin shoreline and San Pablo Bay. There are trails through meadows and woods, and along the bluffs and beaches of San Pablo Bay. Visitors can hike, ride bikes or take the park's shuttle bus to reach the 1,250-foot fishing pier at Point Pinole.

PREWETT FAMILY WATERPARK -- There are pools and water slides for all ages, from the Tad Pool for toddlers to Boulder cove for older swimmers. In addition to fun pools and slides there are fitness pools for lessons and exercise, lawns for relaxing, locker rooms, community room and kitchen. Lap lanes are open year round. Food and beverages are not permitted in the park. Picnic tables are available outside the park.

QUARRY LAKES REGIONAL RECREATION AREA -- The park includes three lakes sculpted from former quarry ponds. The largest, Horseshoe Lake, offers boating and fishing, with a swim beach that will open in the spring. Rainbow Lake is for fishing only, and the third lake, Lago Los Osos, is set aside for wildlife habitat. In addition, there are hiking and bicycling trails that connect to the Alameda Creek Regional Trail. The park includes three lakes sculpted from former quarry ponds. The largest, Horseshoe Lake, offers boating and fishing, with a swim beach that will open in the spring. Rainbow Lake is for fishing only, and the third lake, Lago Los Osos, is set aside for wildlife habitat. In addition there are hiking and bicycling trails that connect to the Alameda Creek Regional Trail.

RUTH BANCROFT GARDEN -- One of America's finest private gardens, the Ruth Bancroft Garden displays 2,000 specimens from around the world that thrive in an arid climate. Included are African and Mexican succulents, New World cacti, Australian and Chilean trees, and shrubs from California.

DOCENT TOUR SCHEDULE -- Saturdays, 10 a.m. Docent-led tours last approximately an hour and a half. Plant sales follow the tour. By reservation only. $7; free children under age 12.

SULPHUR CREEK NATURE CENTER -- A wildlife rehabilitation and education facility where injured and orphaned local wild creatures are rehabilitated and released when possible. There is also a lending library of animals such as guinea pigs, rats, mice and more. The lending fee is $8 per week.

ONGOING EVENTS --

"Toddler Time," Learn about animals by listening to stories and exploring. Themes vary by month. Call for schedule. $7 per family.

"Day on the Green Animal Presentations," Meet an assortment of wild and domestic animals. Wildlife volunteers will present a different animal each day from possums to snakes, tortoises to hawks. Saturday and Sunday, 2:30 p.m.

SUNOL REGIONAL WILDERNESS -- This park is full of scenic and natural wonders. You can hike the Ohlone Wilderness trail or Little Yosemite. There are bedrock mortars that were used by Native Americans, who were Sunol's first inhabitants.

SPECIAL EVENTS --

"Sunol Sunday Hike," Sundays, 1:30-3 p.m. A natural history walk in the wilderness.

ARDENWOOD HISTORIC FARM -- Ardenwood farm is a working farm that dates back to the time of the Patterson Ranch, a 19th-century estate with a mansion and Victorian Gardens. Today, the farm still practices farming techniques from the 1870s. Unless otherwise noted, programs are free with regular admission.

BAY AREA RAIL TRAILS -- A network of trails converted from unused railway corridors and developed by the Rails to Trails Conservancy.

BLACK DIAMOND MINES REGIONAL PRESERVE RAILROAD BED TRAIL -- This easy one mile long rail trail on Mount Diablo leads to many historic sites within the preserve. Suitable for walking, horseback riding, and mountain biking. Accessible year round but may be muddy during the rainy season. Enter from the Park Entrance Station parking lot on the East side of Somersville Road, Antioch.

IRON HORSE REGIONAL TRAIL -- The paved trail has grown into a 23 mile path between Concord and San Ramon with a link into Dublin. The trail runs from the north end of Monument Boulevard at Mohr Lane, east to Interstate 680, in Concord through Walnut Creek to just south of Village Green Park in San Ramon. It will eventually extend from Suisun Bay to Pleasanton and has been nominated as a Community Millennium Trail under the U.S. Millennium Trails program. A smooth shaded trail suitable for walkers, cyclists, skaters and strollers. It is also wheelchair accessible. Difficulty: easy to moderate in small chunks; hard if taken as a whole.

LAFAYETTE/MORAGA REGIONAL TRAIL -- A 7.65 mile paved trail converted from the Sacramento Northern Rail line. This 20-year old trail goes along Las Trampas Creek and parallels St. Mary's Road. Suitable for walkers, equestrians, and cyclists. Runs from Olympic Boulevard and Pleasant Hill Road in Lafayette to Moraga. The trail can be used year round.

OHLONE GREENWAY -- A 3.75-mile paved trail converted from the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe railway. Suitable for walkers, strollers and skaters. It is also wheelchair accessible. The trail runs under elevated BART tracks from Conlon and Key Streets in El Cerrito to Virginia and Acton Streets in Berkeley.

SHEPHERD CANYON TRAIL -- An easy 3-mile paved trail converted from the Sacramento Northern Rail Line. The tree-lined trail is gently sloping and generally follows Shepherd Canyon Road. Suitable for walkers and cyclists. It is also wheelchair accessible. Begins in Montclair Village behind McCaulou's Department Store on Medau Place and ends at Paso Robles Drive, Oakland. Useable year round.

BAY AREA RIDGE TRAIL -- The Bay Area Ridge Trail, when completed, will be a 400-mile regional trail system that will form a loop around the entire San Francisco Bay region, linking 75 public parks and open spaces to thousands of people and hundreds of communities. Hikes on portions of the trail are available through the Bay Area Ridge Trail Council. Call for meeting sites.

ALAMEDA COUNTY -- "Lake Chabot Bike Rides." These rides are for strong beginners and intermediates to build skill, strength and endurance at a non hammerhead pace. No one will be dropped. Reservations required. Distance: 14 miles. Elevation gain: 1,000 feet. Difficulty: beginner to intermediate. Pace: moderate. Meeting place: Lake Chabot Road at the main entrance to the park. Thursday, 6:15 a.m. (510) 468-3582.

CAMRON-STANFORD HOUSE -- The Camron-Stanford House, an 1876 Italianate-style home that was at one time the Oakland Public Museum, has been restored and furnished with appropriate period furnishings by the Camron-Stanford House Preservation Association. It is the last Victorian house on Lake Merritt's shore. Call ahead to confirm tours and hours.

$3-$5; free children ages 11 and under when accompanied by a paying adult; free the first Sunday of the month. Third Wednesday of the month, 1-5 p.m. 1418 Lakeside Drive at 14th Street, Oakland. (510) 444-1876, www.cshouse.org.

CASA PERALTA -- Once the home of descendants of the 19th-century Spanish soldier and Alameda County landowner Don Luis Maria Peralta, the 1821 adobe was remodeled in 1926 as a grand Spanish villa, using some of the original bricks. The casa features a beautiful Moorish exterior design and hand painted tiles imported from Spain, some of which tell the story of Don Quixote. The interior is furnished in 1920s decor. The house will be decorated for the holidays during the month of December. Call ahead to confirm hours.

"Space Day," May 8, 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Chabot's Space Day celebration will include activities and demonstrations, along with "public missions'' in the Challenger Learning Center. $5-$10 for "Missions''

"Make Mother's Day Bloom,'' May 9, 10:30 a.m.-2:30 p.m. Join Chabot to celebrate moms and Mother Nature, and have a photo taken in the "Beyond Blastoff'' exhibit, then craft the picture into flower pots. Before the workshop, treat mom to brunch in the Starlite Bistro. Reservations required. $10 per child (510) 336-7373.

"Connecting Maya Culture and Astronomy," May 29, 10 a.m.-7 p.m. Experience a full day of excitement highlighting the cultural relationship of the May with astronomy with hands-on activities, performances, food, music and more. "Tales of the Maya Skies" will run all day in English, Spanish and Mayan. Free with General Admission.

"Chabot Observatories: A View to the Stars," This new permanent exhibit honors the 123-year history of Chabot and its telescopes. The observatory is one of the oldest public observatories in the United States. The exhibit covers the three different sites of the observatory over its history as well as how its historic telescopes continue to be operated today. Included are informative graphic panels, multimedia kiosks, interactive computer programs, hands-on stations, and historic artifacts.

CHOUINARD VINEYARDS AND WINERY -- The winery features an exhibit of stone craft and baskets honoring the rich culture of the Ohlone Indians. Palomares Canyon was a summer home to the Ohlone Indians. The exhibit also includes historical photos and artifacts that document more recent colorful inhabitants to the canyon.

"Music at Chouinard," 4:30-8:30 p.m. on select Sundays June-August. The rest of the year features live music in the tasting room on the second Sunday of each month. Enjoy the best of Bay Area artists at Chouinard. Bring your own gourmet picnic (no outside alcoholic beverages). Wines are available for tasting and sales. $40 per car.

"Mother's Day Tasting,'' May 9, 12noon-5 p.m. Celebrate Mother's Day with the release of the new Granny Smith Apple Wine paired with smoked cheddar.

CLOSE TO HOME: EXPLORING NATURE'S TREASURES IN THE EAST BAY -- A yearlong program of monthly talks and Saturday outings about the natural history of the East Bay. In this hands-on program learn about the plants, wildlife and watershed of the East Bay's incredibly rich and dynamic bioregion. The 11 Saturday outings will take place in either Alameda or Contra Costa counties. The 10 talks at the Montclair Presbyterian Church will be on the Monday prior to the Saturday outing. A notebook of relevant readings and resources for each outing is available to all participants for an additional $30 per person. The program is cosponsored by the Oakland Museum of California, BayNature Magazine and Earthlight Magazine. Fee for the year covers all outings, talks, site fees, orientation and a party.

"Wildlife Corridors," May 3. Join Jim Hale, wildlife biologist who is currently tracking cougars, badgers and river otters in the East Bay.

"Creek Seekers Express," May 8, 9 a.m.-3 p.m. Climb aboard Amtrak at Jack London Square and ride to Martinez with Christopher Richard, curator of Aquatic Biology at the Oakland Museum of California. The 14 creeks that the trip will pass over all connect to the bay and each one has its own story. Check Web site for more field trip details.

DUNSMUIR HOUSE AND GARDENS HISTORIC ESTATE -- Nestled in the Oakland hills, the 50-acre Dunsmuir House and Gardens estate includes the 37-room Neoclassical Revival Dunsmuir Mansion, built by coal and lumber baron Alexander Dunsmuir for his bride. Restored outbuildings set amid landscaped gardens surround the mansion.

ESTATE GROUNDS -- Self-Guided Grounds Tours are available yearround. The 50 acres of gardens and grounds at the mansion are open to the public for walking Tuesday-Friday, 9 a.m.-4 p.m. Booklets and maps of the grounds are available at the Dinkelspiel House. Free.

GUIDED TOURS -- Docent-led tours are available on the first Sunday of each month at 1 p.m. and 2 p.m. (except for July) and Wednesdays at 11 a.m. $5 adults, $4 seniors and juniors (11-16), children 11 and under free.

EUGENE O'NEILL NATIONAL HISTORIC SITE -- Closed on New Year's Day. Visit Eugene O'Neill's famous Tao House and its tranquil grounds. Phone reservations required for a ranger-led, twoand-a-half-hour tour. Tours are given Wednesday through Sunday at 10 a.m. and 12:30 p.m. Please note: The National Park Service provides a free shuttle van for transportation to Tao House. Access via private vehicle is not available.

FENTONS CREAMERY -- Fenton's Creamery, founded in 1894, offers "backstage" tours that show how ice cream is made, how flavors are created, and all that goes into their famous sundaes. The history of Fenton's is also covered. Tours last 20-30 minutes (including samples). Children must be 6 years and accompanied by an adult.

FIFTY-PLUS ADVENTURE WALKS AND RUNS -- The walks and runs are 3-mile round-trips, lasting about one hour on the trail. All levels of ability are welcome. The walks are brisk, however, and may include some uphill terrain. Events are held rain or shine and on all holidays except Christmas and the Fifty-Plus Annual Fitness Weekend. Call for dates, times and details.

FOREST HOME FARMS -- The 16-acre former farm of the Boone family is now a municipal historic park in San Ramon. It is located at the base of the East Bay Hills and is divided into two parts by Oak Creek. The Boone House is a 22-room Dutch colonial that has been remodeled several times since it was built in 1900. Also on the property are a barn built in the period from 1850 to 1860; the Victorian-style David Glass House, dating from the late 1860s to early 1870s; a storage structure for farm equipment and automobiles; and a walnut processing plant.

GOLDEN GATE LIVE STEAMERS -- Small locomotives, meticulously scaled to size, run along a half mile of track in Tilden Regional Park. The small trains are owned and maintained by a non-profit group of railroad buffs that offer rides. Come out for the monthly family run and barbeque at the track, offered on the fourth Sunday of the month.

GOLDEN STATE MODEL RAILROAD MUSEUM -- 2010 season opens April 4. The museum, which is handicapped accessible, features extensive displays of operating model railroads constructed and operated by the East Bay Model Engineers Society. Covering some 10,000 square feet, steam and modern diesel-powered freight and passenger trains operate in O, HO and N scales on separate layouts as well as narrow gauge and trolley lines. Of special interest is the Tehachapi Pass and Loop on the N-scale layout showing how the multiple engine trains traverse the gorges and tunnels, passing over themselves to gain altitude to cross Tehachapi Summit just east of Bakersfield. The layouts include such famous railroad landmarks as Niles Canyon, Donner Pass and the Oakland Mole where transcontinental passengers were ferried across San Francisco Bay from their arriving trains. VIEW THE LAYOUTS ONLY ON WEDNESDAYS AND SATURDAYS; WATCH TRAINS RUN ON THE LAYOUTS ON SUNDAYS.

GONDOLA SERVIZIO -- "Gondola Servizio." Weather permitting. Take a ride around Lake Merritt in a real Venetian gondola rowed by a Venetian-style gondolier. The boats of Gondola Servizio were built by hand in Venice. Each gondola seats up to six people and reservations are required.

GREENBELT ALLIANCE OUTINGS -- A series of hikes, bike rides and events sponsored by Greenbelt Alliance, the Bay Area's non-profit land conservation and urban planning organization. Call for meeting places. Reservations required for all trips.

ALAMEDA COUNTY -- "Self-Guided Urban Outing: Berkeley," This interactive smart growth walking tour of central Berkeley examines some of the exciting projects that help alleviate the housing shortage in the city as well as amenities important to making a livable community. The walk, which includes the GAIA Cultural Center, Allston Oak Court, The Berkeley Bike Station, University Terrace and Strawberry Creek Park, takes between an hour-and-ahalf to two hours at a leisurely pace. Download the itinerary which gives specific directions by entering www.greeenbelt.org and clicking on "get involved'' and then "urban outings.'' Drop down and click on Berkeley. Free.

CONTRA COSTA COUNTY -- "Get to the Point," May 2, 10 a.m.-2 p.m. Explore the natural beauty and cultural history of Miller/Knox Regional Shoreline and Point Richmond.

JOHN MUIR NATIONAL HISTORIC SITE -- The site preserves the 1882 Muir House, a 17-room Victorian mansion where naturalist John Muir lived from 1890 to his death in 1914. It was here that Muir wrote about preserving America's wilderness and helped create the national parks idea for the United States. The house is situated on a hill overlooking the City of Martinez and surrounded by nine acres of vineyards and orchards. Take a self-guided tour of this well-known Scottish naturalist's home. Also part of the site is the historic Martinez Adobe and Mount Wanda.

Public Tours of the John Muir House, Begin with an eight-minute park film and then take the tour. The film runs every 15 minutes throughout the day. Wednesday through Friday, 2 p.m.; Saturday and Sunday, 1 p.m., 2 p.m. and 3 p.m.

MOUNT WANDA -- The mountain consists of 325 acres of grass and oak woodland historically owned by the Muir family. It offers a nature trail and several fire trails for hiking. Open daily, sunrise to sunset.

JOHN MUIR HOUSE, Tours of this well-known Scottish naturalist's home are available. The house, built in 1882, is a 14-room Victorian home situated on a hill overlooking the city of Martinez and surrounded by nine acres of vineyards and orchards. It was here that Muir wrote about preserving America's wilderness and helped create the national parks idea for the United States. The park also includes the historic Vicente Martinez Adobe, built in 1849. An eight-minute film about Muir and the site is shown every 15 minutes throughout the day at the Visitor Center. Self guided tours of the Muir home, the surrounding orchards, and the Martinez Adobe: Wednesday-Sunday, 1 a.m.-5 p.m. Public tours or the first floor of the Muir home: Wednesday-Friday, 2 p.m.; Saturday-Sunday, 2 p.m. and 3 p.m. Reservations not required except for large groups.

LAWRENCE BERKELEY NATIONAL LABORATORY -- Scientists and engineers guide visitors through the research areas of the laboratory, demonstrating emerging technology and discussing the research's current and potential applications. A Berkeley lab tour usually lasts two and a half hours and includes visits to several research areas. Popular tour sites include the Advanced Light Source, The National Center for Electron Microscopy, the 88-Inch Cyclotron, The Advanced Lighting Laboratory and The Human Genome Laboratory. Reservations required at least two weeks in advance of tour. Wear comfortable walking shoes. Photography is permitted. Due to heightened security after Sept. 11, 2001, tour participants will be asked for photo identification and citizenship information. Tours are periodically available by special request. Contact the Community Relations Office, (510) 486-7292, for additional information. To add your name to a list of potential public tour participants, email community@lbl.gov.

LAWRENCE LIVERMORE NATIONAL LABORATORY -- The Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory offer two different tours of its facilities.

Livermore Main Site Tours are offered twice weekly. Highlights of the twoand-a-half-hour tour are visits to the Biology and Biotechnology Building, the National Atmospheric Release Center Advisory Center, and ASC/White, one of the nation's largest, most powerful supercomputers. All tours include a stop at the Lab's Discovery Center. Visitors must be U.S. citizens and 18 years or older. Two-week advance reservations required. Tours are available for non-U.S. citizens with 60 to 90 days advance reservation. Tours are on alternating Tuesdays and Thursdays, 9 a.m.

Site 300 is the Laboratory's 7,000 acre non-nuclear explosive test facility just east of Tracy. Tours may include Western vantage points for observation of the site and surrounding properties, an external view of the Contained Firing Facility, and Environmental remediation facilities and wetlands. Visitors must be U.S. citizens and 18 years or older. Two-week advance reservations required. Tours are available for non-U.S. citizens with 60 to 90 days advance reservation. Tours are on the first and third Fridays of the month from 10 a.m.-12:30 p.m. with the exception of June when the annual controlled burn takes place at the site. Reservations may be made online or by telephone.

NATIONAL LABORATORY DISCOVERY CENTER -- Tuesdays-Fridays, 1 p.m.-4 p.m.; Saturdays, 10 a.m.-2 p.m. The Center is a window into the Laboratory where visitors can experience a broad-based display of the scientific technology developed at the Laboratory as well as highlights of the Lab's research and history in such areas as defense, homeland security, the environment, cancer and new energy sources.

There is no citizenship limitation or age limit for visiting the Discovery Center. Call ahead to confirm the Center is open. Located off Greenville Road on Eastgate Drive, just outside the Laboratory's East Gate. Free. (925) 423-3272.

LINDSAY WILDLIFE MUSEUM -- This is the oldest and largest wildlife rehabilitation center in America, taking in 6,000 injured and orphaned animals yearly and returning 40 percent of them to the wild. The museum offers a wide range of educational programs using non-releasable wild animals to teach children and adults respect for the balance of nature. The museum includes a state-of-the art wildlife hospital which features a permanent exhibit, titled "Living with Nature,'' which houses 75 non-releasable wild animals in learning environments; a 5,000-square-foot Wildlife Hospital complete with treatment rooms, intensive care, quarantine and laboratory facilities; a 1-acre Nature Garden featuring the region's native landscaping and wildlife; and an "Especially For Children'' exhibit.

WILDLIFE HOSPITAL -- September-March: 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. The hospital is open daily including holidays to receive injured and orphaned animals. There is no charge for treatment of native wild animals and there are no public viewing areas in the hospital.

MOUNT DIABLO SUMMIT MUSEUM -- The museum is located in a historic stone building atop Mt. Diablo's highest peak and features ongoing exhibits that chronicle the history of the mountain. An instructional video examines the geological forces that created the mountain and panel displays describe the Native American history of the region. A diorama provides an overview of the mountain's ecosystems. Telescopes are mounted on the Observation Deck so visitors can enjoy one of the finest views in the world.

MOUNTAIN VIEW CEMETERY WALKING TOURS -- Take a three-hour, docent-led walking tour of this cemetery, designed by renowned architect Fredrich Law Olmsted, where many historical figures, both local and national, are buried.

Special Events, "Memorial Day Commemoration,'' May 25, 10 a.m. The Mountain View Cemetery honors all veterans with a traditional placing of the wreath and a 21 gun salute, followed by a dove release. The event also features keynote speaker Capt. Keith J. Terro, Commanding Officer of Integrated Support Command in Alameda.

NIMITZ WALK -- A level, paved walk originally constructed when the army was considering putting a missile site in the hills above Berkeley. Near Inspiration Point; from San Pablo Dam Road turn west onto Wildcat Canyon Road in Orinda. The entrance to the walk, and a parking lot, is at the top of the ridge. This is an easy hike for people of all ages and especially ideal for the very old, the very young, and the disabled. Bicycles and roller blades are allowed.

OAKLAND ARTISAN MARKETPLACE -- www.oaklandartisanmarketplace.org/. A weekly market featuring the fine arts and crafts created by local artists. Included will be handmade jewelry, sculptures, ceramics, paintings and drawings, photography, dolls, floral arrangements, clothing, soaps, and greeting cards. The three weekly markets are at different sites in Oakland.

Free. (510) 238-4948.

OAKLAND CASTING CLUB MEETINGS -- The Oakland Casting Club and Department of Parks and Recreation present free fly-casting clinics in this monthly meeting. Experts of the club will be on hand to offer tips and training techniques for youths and adults. Everything from basic casting to advanced techniques will be taught. Beginners or experienced anglers welcome. No registration or appointment necessary, but please e-mail ahead (and include relative skill level) to give notice of your participation, if possible.

Meetings are held at McCrea Park, located at Carson Street and Aliso Avenue (just off Hwy. 13), Oakland. Third Saturday of the month March-July. Oakland. www.oaklandcastingclub.org.

OAKLAND ZOO -- The zoo includes a Children's Petting Zoo, the Skyride, a miniature train, a carousel, picnic grounds and a gift shop as well as the animals in site specific exhibits, which allow them to roam freely. Included are "The African Savanna,'' with its two huge mixed-animal aviaries and 11 African Savanna exhibits; the Mahali Pa Tembo (Place of the Elephant), with giraffes, chimpanzees and more than 330 other animals from around the world; "Simba Pori,'' Swahili for "Lion Country,'' a spacious 1.5-acre habitat offering both a savanna and woodland setting for African lions; "Footprints from the Past,'' an anthropology exhibit showcasing four million years of human evolution and an actual "footpath'' of the first hominids to emerge from the African savanna; "Sun Bear Exhibit,'' a stateof-the-art space the zoo has developed for its two sun bears; and Siamang Island, a state-of-the-art, barrier-free area that emulates the gibbons' native tropical rain forest habitat. Also see the Malayan Fruit Bats from the Lubee Bat Conservancy in Florida that are now roosting in trees at the zoo. In addition there are special exhibits and events monthly.

OLD MISSION SAN JOSE -- Take a self-guided tour of the Mission, a replica of the original mission church that was one of a chain of California missions begun by Father Junipero Serra in 1769. Mission San Jose was founded in 1797. The mission chain stretches from San Diego to San Rafael. The tour includes the church, grounds, an adobe building and historic memorabilia.

PARAMOUNT THEATRE TOUR -- The historic Paramount Theatre is a restored art deco masterpiece from the movie palace era. The two-hour tour covers areas not usually accessible to the public. Cameras are allowed. Children must be at least 10 years old and accompanied by adult chaperones.

PARDEE HOME MUSEUM -- The historic Pardee Mansion, a three-story Italianate villa built in 1868, was home to three generations of the Pardee family who were instrumental in the civic and cultural development of California and Oakland. The home includes the house, grounds, water tower and barn. Reservations recommended.

RUTH BANCROFT GARDEN -- One of America's finest private gardens, the Ruth Bancroft Garden displays 2,000 specimens from around the world that thrive in an arid climate. Included are African and Mexican succulents, New World cacti, Australian and Chilean trees, and shrubs from California.

DOCENT TOUR SCHEDULE -- Saturdays, 10 a.m. Docent-led tours last approximately an hour and a half. Plant sales follow the tour. By reservation only. $7; free children under age 12.

Gardens open only for tours and special events listed on the garden's telephone information line. 1500 Bancroft Road, Walnut Creek. (925) 210-9663, www.ruthbancroftgarden.org.

SCHARFFEN BERGER CHOCOLATE FACTORY -- This hour-long tour covers the history of chocolate making, from the cultivation of cacao beans to the finished product. After a chocolate tasting, visitors take a walking tour of the factory floor. Open to children 10 and up. Reservations required.

SHADELANDS RANCH HISTORICAL MUSEUM -- Built by Walnut Creek pioneer Hiram Penniman, this 1903 redwoodframed house is a showcase for numerous historical artifacts, many of which belonged to the Pennimans. It also houses a rich archive of Contra Costa and Walnut Creek history in its collections of old newspapers, photographs and government records.

SULPHUR CREEK NATURE CENTER -- A wildlife rehabilitation and education facility where injured and orphaned local wild creatures are rehabilitated and released when possible. There is also a lending library of animals such as guinea pigs, rats, mice and more. The lending fee is $8 per week.

USS HORNET MUSEUM -- Come aboard this World War II aircraft carrier that has been converted into a floating museum. The Hornet, launched in 1943, is 899 feet long and 27 stories high. During World War II she was never hit by an enemy strike or plane and holds the Navy record for number of enemy planes shot down in a week. In 1969 the Hornet recovered the Apollo 11 space capsule containing the first men to walk on the moon, and later recovered Apollo 12. In 1991 the Hornet was designated a National Historic Landmark and is now docked at the same pier she sailed from in 1944. Today, visitors can tour the massive ship, view World War II-era warplanes and experience a simulated aircraft launch from the carrier's deck. Exhibits are being added on an ongoing basis. Allow two to three hours for a visit. Wear comfortable shoes and be prepared to climb steep stairs or ladders. Dress in layers as the ship can be cold. Arrive no later than 2 p.m. to sign up for the engine room and other docent-led tours. Children under age 12 are not allowed in the Engine Room or the Combat Information Center.

ARDENWOOD HISTORIC FARM -- Ardenwood farm is a working farm that dates back to the time of the Patterson Ranch, a 19th-century estate with a mansion and Victorian Gardens. Today, the farm still practices farming techniques from the 1870s. Unless otherwise noted, programs are free with regular admission.

BLACK DIAMOND MINES REGIONAL PRESERVE -- Originally the home of several Native American tribes, white men began coal mining in the area in the 1860s. The preserve today features old mines and displays of the history of the area.

SPECIAL EVENTS --

"Time Traveling Trekkers," May 1, 9 a.m.-noon. Learn about the history of the park on a 2-mile strenuous hike.

"Prospect Tunnel Picnic," May 8, 9 a.m.-noon. Carpool to the eastern reaches of the park to take a trip underground to see late bloomers.

"Painting in the Park," May 9, 10-11:30 a.m. Gather various minerals and elemtns and turn them into art.

AUTOMOTIVE MUSEUM -- The museum's permanent exhibition of internationally renowned automobiles dated from 1897 to the 1980s. The cars are displayed as works of art with room to walk completely around each car to admire the workmanship. On long-term loan from the Smithsonian Institution is a Long Steam Tricycle; an 1893-94 Duryea, the first Duryea built by the Duryea brothers; and a 1948 Tucker, number 39 of the 51 Tuckers built, which is a Model 48 "Torpedo'' four-door sedan.

BUILD-A-BEAR WORKSHOP -- An interactive place where children, and adults, can learn how a stuffed animal is made, then choose an animal pattern from the offering of bears, elephants, dogs and rabbits; stuff the chosen animal; dress it; and create a birth certificate. Closed on Thanksgiving and Christmas.

COYOTE HILLS REGIONAL PARK -- The park is located on the shoreline of Fremont Bay and features rich wetland areas as well as Ohlone Indian shellmound sites. Hiking in the park allows scenic views of San Francisco Bay and southern Alameda County. The 12-mile Alameda Creek Trail runs from the Bay east to the mouth of Niles Canyon and features an equestrian trail as well as a bicycle trail; hikers are welcome on both. The park conducts naturalist programs and has a visitor center with a nature store and Ohlone, natural history and wildlife exhibits.

SPECIAL EVENTS -- Free unless otherwise noted.

"Do Butterflies and Bees Have Knees," May 8, 10:30 a.m.-12:30 p.m. Observe these animals as they are absorbed with feeding.

"Focus on Wildlife: A Photo Exhibit," May 9, 10:30 a.m.-noon. View the best of Coyote Hills wildlife photographs.

"Lends on Wildlife: Tips and Tricks," May 9, 1-2:30 p.m. Join experienced photographers in the nectar garden to learn tips and tricks for capturing stunning photos of birds and butterflies.

"Buki the Clown," May 1 through May 2, 1:30 and 2:30 p.m. Buki the Clown and her way cool, magic show is here to make you laugh and giggle at her crazy antics!

"Puppet Show: Perez and Mondinga," May 1 through May 2 and May 8 through May 2, 11 a.m., 2 and 4 p.m. It's fiesta time in Mexico. Mondinga, the cockroach, wants to marry and share her hacienda with someone special. Rooster, Pig and evil Cat all want to marry her, yet none is right. Finally she meets Perez the gentle mouse and marries him. This is the silly story of their meeting, marriage and mishaps, just in time for Cinco De Mayo!Ole'! Scenery & Puppets by Lewis Mahlmann

"The Blue Fairy," May 8 through May 9, 1:30 and 2:30 p.m. Jacquelyn Lynaugh as The Blue Fairy appears with her puppet pal Pinocchio and her guitar, Prince Charming. She will be performing well known folk songs and helping children make wishes come true with her crystal wand and fairy dust.

CRAB COVE VISITOR CENTER -- At Crab Cove, you can see live underwater creatures and go into the San Francisco Bay from land. You can also travel back in time to Alameda's part. The goal is to increase understanding of the environmental importance of San Francisco Bay and the ocean ecosystem. Crab Cove's Indoor Aquarium and Exhibit Lab is one of the largest indoor aquariums in the East Bay.

SPECIAL EVENTS --

"Sea Siblings," Tuesdays, 9:30 a.m. and 11 a.m. Explore the natural world and take part in a theme related craft. Designed for the 3-5 year old learner. Registration is required. $4. (888) 327-2757.

"Catch of the Day," Sundays, 2-3 p.m. Drop by to find out more about the Bay and its wildlife through guided exploration and hands-on fun.

DUNSMUIR HOUSE AND GARDENS HISTORIC ESTATE -- Nestled in the Oakland hills, the 50-acre Dunsmuir House and Gardens estate includes the 37-room Neoclassical Revival Dunsmuir Mansion, built by coal and lumber baron Alexander Dunsmuir for his bride. Restored outbuildings set amid landscaped gardens surround the mansion.

ESTATE GROUNDS -- Self-Guided Grounds Tours are available yearround. The 50 acres of gardens and grounds at the mansion are open to the public for walking Tuesday-Friday, 9 a.m.-4 p.m. Booklets and maps of the grounds are available at the Dinkelspiel House. Free.

GUIDED TOURS -- Docent-led tours are available on the first Sunday of each month at 1 p.m. and 2 p.m. (except for July) and Wednesdays at 11 a.m. $5 adults, $4 seniors and juniors (11-16), children 11 and under free.

FOREST HOME FARMS -- The 16-acre former farm of the Boone family is now a municipal historic park in San Ramon. It is located at the base of the East Bay Hills and is divided into two parts by Oak Creek. The Boone House is a 22-room Dutch colonial that has been remodeled several times since it was built in 1900. Also on the property are a barn built in the period from 1850 to 1860; the Victorian-style David Glass House, dating from the late 1860s to early 1870s; a storage structure for farm equipment and automobiles; and a walnut processing plant.

HABITOT CHILDREN'S MUSEUM -- A museum especially for children ages 7 and under. Highlights include "WaterWorks,'' an area with some unusual water toys, an Infant Tree for babies, a garden especially for toddlers, a child-scale grocery store and cafe, and a costume shop and stage for junior thespians. The museum also features a toy lending library.

HALL OF HEALTH -- A community health-education museum and science center promoting wellness and individual responsibility for health. There are hands-on exhibits that teach about the workings of the human body, the value of a healthy diet and exercise, and the destructive effects of smoking and drug abuse. "Kids on the Block'' puppet shows, which use puppets from diverse cultures to teach about and promote acceptance of conditions such as cerebral palsy, Down Syndrome, leukemia, blindness, arthritis and spina bifida, are available by request for community events and groups visiting the Hall on Saturdays.

HAYWARD SHORELINE INTERPRETIVE CENTER -- Perched on stilts above a salt marsh, the Center offers an introduction to the San Francisco Bay-Estuary. It features exhibits, programs and activities designed to inspire a sense of appreciation, respect and stewardship for the Bay, its inhabitants and the services they provide. The Habitat Room offers a preview of what may be seen outside. The 80-gallon Bay Tank contains some of the fish that live in the Bay's open waters, and the Channel Tank represents habitats formed by the maze of sloughs and creeks that snake through the marsh. The main room of the Center features rotating exhibits about area history, plants and wildlife. Part of the Hayward Area Recreation and Park District.

LINDSAY WILDLIFE MUSEUM -- This is the oldest and largest wildlife rehabilitation center in America, taking in 6,000 injured and orphaned animals yearly and returning 40 percent of them to the wild. The museum offers a wide range of educational programs using non-releasable wild animals to teach children and adults respect for the balance of nature. The museum includes a state-of-the art wildlife hospital which features a permanent exhibit, titled "Living with Nature,'' which houses 75 non-releasable wild animals in learning environments; a 5,000-square-foot Wildlife Hospital complete with treatment rooms, intensive care, quarantine and laboratory facilities; a 1-acre Nature Garden featuring the region's native landscaping and wildlife; and an "Especially For Children'' exhibit.

WILDLIFE HOSPITAL -- September-March: 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. The hospital is open daily including holidays to receive injured and orphaned animals. There is no charge for treatment of native wild animals and there are no public viewing areas in the hospital.

MUSEUM OF CHILDREN'S ART -- A museum of art for and by children, with activities for children to participate in making their own art.

ART CAMPS -- Hands-on activities and engaging curriculum for children of different ages, led by professional artists and staff. $60 per day.

CLASSES -- A Sunday series of classes for children ages 8 to 12, led by Mocha artists. Sundays, 2 p.m. to 4 p.m.

OPEN STUDIOS -- Drop-in art play activities with new themes each week.

"Big Studio." Guided art projects for children age 6 and older with a Mocha artist. Tuesday through Friday, 4 p.m. to 5 p.m. $5.

"Little Studio." A hands-on experience that lets young artists age 18 months to 5 years see, touch and manipulate a variety of media. Children can get messy. Tuesday through Friday, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. $5.

OAKLAND ZOO -- The zoo includes a Children's Petting Zoo, the Skyride, a miniature train, a carousel, picnic grounds and a gift shop as well as the animals in site specific exhibits, which allow them to roam freely. Included are "The African Savanna,'' with its two huge mixed-animal aviaries and 11 African Savanna exhibits; the Mahali Pa Tembo (Place of the Elephant), with giraffes, chimpanzees and more than 330 other animals from around the world; "Simba Pori,'' Swahili for "Lion Country,'' a spacious 1.5-acre habitat offering both a savanna and woodland setting for African lions; "Footprints from the Past,'' an anthropology exhibit showcasing four million years of human evolution and an actual "footpath'' of the first hominids to emerge from the African savanna; "Sun Bear Exhibit,'' a stateof-the-art space the zoo has developed for its two sun bears; and Siamang Island, a state-of-the-art, barrier-free area that emulates the gibbons' native tropical rain forest habitat. Also see the Malayan Fruit Bats from the Lubee Bat Conservancy in Florida that are now roosting in trees at the zoo. In addition there are special exhibits and events monthly.

POINT PINOLE REGIONAL SHORELINE -- The 2,315-acre parkland bordering Pinole, Richmond and San Pablo offers views of Mount Tamalpais, the Marin shoreline and San Pablo Bay. There are trails through meadows and woods, and along the bluffs and beaches of San Pablo Bay. Visitors can hike, ride bikes or take the park's shuttle bus to reach the 1,250-foot fishing pier at Point Pinole.

SCHARFFEN BERGER CHOCOLATE FACTORY -- This hour-long tour covers the history of chocolate making, from the cultivation of cacao beans to the finished product. After a chocolate tasting, visitors take a walking tour of the factory floor. Open to children 10 and up. Reservations required.

SULPHUR CREEK NATURE CENTER -- A wildlife rehabilitation and education facility where injured and orphaned local wild creatures are rehabilitated and released when possible. There is also a lending library of animals such as guinea pigs, rats, mice and more. The lending fee is $8 per week.

ONGOING EVENTS --

"Toddler Time," Learn about animals by listening to stories and exploring. Themes vary by month. Call for schedule. $7 per family.

"Day on the Green Animal Presentations," Meet an assortment of wild and domestic animals. Wildlife volunteers will present a different animal each day from possums to snakes, tortoises to hawks. Saturday and Sunday, 2:30 p.m.

USS HORNET MUSEUM -- Come aboard this World War II aircraft carrier that has been converted into a floating museum. The Hornet, launched in 1943, is 899 feet long and 27 stories high. During World War II she was never hit by an enemy strike or plane and holds the Navy record for number of enemy planes shot down in a week. In 1969 the Hornet recovered the Apollo 11 space capsule containing the first men to walk on the moon, and later recovered Apollo 12. In 1991 the Hornet was designated a National Historic Landmark and is now docked at the same pier she sailed from in 1944. Today, visitors can tour the massive ship, view World War II-era warplanes and experience a simulated aircraft launch from the carrier's deck. Exhibits are being added on an ongoing basis. Allow two to three hours for a visit. Wear comfortable shoes and be prepared to climb steep stairs or ladders. Dress in layers as the ship can be cold. Arrive no later than 2 p.m. to sign up for the engine room and other docent-led tours. Children under age 12 are not allowed in the Engine Room or the Combat Information Center.

ALCATRAZ ISLAND TOURS -- On the Island, The National Park Service offers a captioned orientation video with historical footage, self-guided walks, exhibits, and Ranger interpretive talks. Also available is an award-winning audio tour in the prison Cell House with actual interviews of former guards and inmates, available in six languages. There is a steep uphill walk to the Cell House.

EXHIBITS --

"Alcatraz and the American Prison Experience," an exhibit explaining the place of Alcatraz in the evolution of prisons in America from Colonial days to the present.

ANGEL ISLAND STATE PARK -- On the Island there are guided history tours, Tram Tour and nature walks featuring the Quarantine Station, the Immigration Station, Camp Reynolds and Fort McDowell. There are also hiking and biking trails around the island. Tram tours are one-hour, audio-enhanced tours, which cover the island's military history from the Civil War to the Cold War; its past use as an immigration station where 175,000 Chinese, other Asians and Europeans were detained before continuing on into the mainland United States; and its current state park status. Bikes can be rented on the island. Call for ferry schedule.

Prices vary depending on which ferry is used. Bicycle rentals: $10 per hour or $30 all day for basic mountain bicycles and helmets. Daily, 8 a.m.-sunset. (415) 435-1915, www.angelisland.com.

AQUARIUM OF THE BAY -- This aquarium gives a diver's-eye view of the inhabitants of San Francisco Bay, including fish, sharks, crabs, jellyfish, eels, octopus, and other underwater wildlife swimming freely over and around you as you travel on a moving sidewalk through the aquarium's two-story-tall, 707,000-gallon tanks. A platform beside the sidewalk allows you to step off at any time and take a longer look at the wildlife.

SPECIAL EVENTS --

"Behind-the-Scenes Tours," Take a guided tour with one of the Aquarium naturalists to find out what goes on behind the huge fish tanks. Reservations required. Tour price includes admission. $14-$21.95. (415) 623-5376.

"Mother's Day,'' May 9. Aquarium of the Bay is honoring all human mothers and grandmothers with free admission on Mother's Day, when accompanied by a child or grandchild.

$8-$15.95; free children 2 and under. $39.95 for a family of four. General Summer Hours: Daily, 9 a.m.-8 p.m.; General Winter Hours: Monday-Thursday, 10 a.m.-6 p.m., Friday-Sunday, 10 a.m.-7 p.m.; Check website for current hours as they may change due to special events. East of Pier 39, Beach Street and The Embarcadero, San Francisco. (888) SEA-DIVE, www.aquariumofthebay.com.

BARBARY COAST TRAIL -- This 3.8-mile, self-guided tour sponsored by the San Francisco Historical Society begins at the Old U.S. Mint at Fifth and Mission streets and stretches to Aquatic Park. It covers 20 historic sites including a 19th century shanghaiing den and the oldest Asian temple in North America. Five local museums dot the trail. Walkers need to buy either the 32-page "Barbary Coast Trail Official Guide'' ($8.95) or the 247-page "Walking San Francisco on the Barbary Coast'' ($15.95). Both are available at bookstores or at the California Historical Society at 678 Mission St.

BAY AREA RAIL TRAILS -- A network of trails converted from unused railway corridors throughout the Bay Area by the Rails to Trails Conservancy.

BARBARY COAST TRAIL -- A 3-mile, paved trail on an abandoned railroad right of way. The railroad was constructed by the U.S. military in the early 1900s to bring visitors from downtown San Francisco to the 1915 Panama Pacific International Exposition. Runs from the intersection of Jefferson and Hyde streets to Crissy Field in the Presidio. Suitable for hikers and bikers. It is also wheelchair accessible.

LAND'S END TRAIL -- A 2-mile trail of dirt and sand converted from a former urban rail line built by Adolph Sutro in 1884. The trail offers unbeatable views of the Golden Gate Bridge. Difficulty: moderate. Runs from the parking lot north of the Cliff House to El Camino del Mar near 33rd Avenue, San Francisco. Suitable for hiking, running, mountain biking, horseback riding, and fishing. Wheelchair accessible. Difficulty: moderate. The trail includes some steep stairs and uneven trail surfaces.

BAY AREA RIDGE TRAIL -- The Bay Area Ridge Trail, when completed, will be a 400-mile regional trail system that will form a loop around the entire San Francisco Bay region, linking 75 public parks and open spaces to thousands of people and hundreds of communities. Hikes on portions of the trail are available through the Bay Area Ridge Trail Council. Call for meeting sites. Sign up for events online to reserve your spot with hike leaders.

ONGOING EVENT --

SAN FRANCISCO-SAN MATEO COUNTIES -- "Fifield/Cahill Ridge Trail," Guided tours are on Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday. This is a chance for small groups of hikers, bicyclists or equestrians to trek through the pristine 23,000-acre Crystal Springs Watershed, one of the Bay Area s most treasured and forbidden places. The trail is a gravel service road that travels through old-growth Douglas fir, grasslands and chaparral and along ridges offering sweeping views of the Bay Area. The treks are docent-led and reservations made through the San Francisco Water District are required. Sign on to www.sfwater.org to make a reservation. Free.

BAY QUACKERS -- Experience San Francisco in a whole new way aboard a DUKW, an original, refurbished amphibious landing craft from the second World War. The "Duck'' will take visitors on an 80-minute drive through many of San Francisco's famous areas, including Fisherman's Wharf, North Beach, South Beach, Union Square, China Basin and more. Then the captain will drive out of the city and into San Francisco Bay for a cruise to Alameda County on the water. Tours operate 365 days a year, rain or shine. The vehicles are covered and heated.

HISTORY WALKABOUTS -- A series of monthly walking tours that explore the history, lore and architecture of California with veteran tour guide Gary Holloway. Walks take place rain or shine so dress for the weather. Reservations and prepayment required. Meeting place will be given with confirmation of tour reservation. Tour price includes admission to the Museum.

MUSEUM -- The museum's permanent collection is made up of the Fine Arts Collection, consisting of 5,000 works of art that represent the history of California from pre-Gold Rush days to the early decade of the 20th century; and The Photography Collection, containing nearly a halfmillion images in an array of photographic formats documenting the history of California in both the 19th and 20th centuries. The Library and Research Collection contain material relating to the history of California and the West from early exploration time to the present including texts, maps, and manuscripts.

"Landscape and Vision: Early California Painters from the Collections of the California Historical Society," open-ended. An exhibit of oil paintings including a large number of early landscapes of California, from the museum's collection.

"The Midnight Rollers' Friday Night Skate,'' The Midnight Rollers meet Friday nights to skate a 12-mile route through San Francisco. The skate begins near the Ferry Building at the foot of Market Street, weather permitting.

CHINATOWN ALLEYWAY TOURS -- Learn about the significance and secrets of Chinatown's alleyways during a unique two-hour tour that aims to educate people about the history and current issues of the Chinatown community. Look for tour guides with blue sweaters or gray Chinatown Alleyways Tours t-shirts. Payment must be made in cash or check, guides do not carry change, bring exact amount that you will owe for your group.

For Tour only: $20-$30; free children under age 6; Tour and Dim Sum Luncheon: $35-$45; free children under age 6. Daily, 10 a.m. Meet at Old St. Mary's Cathedral, 660 California St., San Francisco. (415) 982-8839, www.allaboutchinatown.com.

CHINATOWN GHOST WALKING TOUR -- San Francisco's Chinatown Ghost Tours bring to life the tales of Chinatown's supernatural past and present as walkers are led on a ghostly tour of its historic and mysterious streets and alleyways. The mystical folklore of this spirited San Francisco enclave will keep guests on edge as they drink in the chilling experiences of the Chinatown inhabitants of both yesterday and today.

Tours start at 7:30 p.m. and run for about an hour-and-a-half. All tours are by reservation only. Meet at Four Seas Restaurant, 731 Grant Ave., San Francisco.

$16-$24. Friday-Saturday, 7:30 p.m. (415) 793-1183.

CHINATOWN WALKING TOURS -- Chinatown Walk Tour with "Wok Wiz'' Shirley Fong-Torres. The 90-minute tour covers the history, people, culture, folklore and food of Chinatown. The tour is a unique slice of life from this neighborhood and may include a visit to, or a discussion of: Chinatown's history, art and architecture, Chinese groceries, herbal pharmacies, pastry shops, produce markets, a tea tasting or tea ceremony, temples and associations. The tour concludes with a traditional Chinese dim-sum lunch that is optional. Reservations required.

SPECIAL TOUR -- Call to confirm tours are departing.

"Daily Tour," Daily, 10 a.m. Learn about the history and culture of Chinatown as you look around a temple, browse the markets, try various teas and enjoy a lunch featuring an array of dim sum as well as some local specialties.

"I Can't Believe I Ate My Way Through Chinatown Tour,'' Saturdays and some Sundays. Call for schedule. Intended for food lovers, this tour, led by chef/owner Shirley Fong-Torres, begins with a Chinese breakfast and continues with some dim sum nibbles on the street, a visit to a wok shop or hardware store as well as to food markets, and ends with a hosted lunch. Reservations required. Times and meeting place will be given with reservation. $90 per person. (415) 981-8989.

CHINESE HERITAGE WALK -- Tuesday-Saturday, 10 a.m., noon, and 2 p.m.; Sunday at noon and 2 p.m. These docent-conducted walks emphasize the cultural achievements, social progress and history of Chinese in San Francisco. The two hour walk begins at the Chinese Culture Center and may include such places of interest as such as a Chinese temple, market, fortune cookie factory and many architectural and historical points of interest. Reservations required 3 days in advance for groups of five of less, there is a minimum charge of $50. Groups of more than five should allowe at least two weeks advance booking. $20-$25, free for children under five. (415) 986-1822 X24.

CITY GUIDES WALKING TOURS OF SAN FRANCISCO -- Discover San Francisco's neighborhoods on foot. Learn about The City's history, architecture, legends and lore on this series of walking tours organized under the auspices of the San Francisco Public Library. Use the library to learn more about the area toured. A suggested reading list is available for every tour topic. At the starting point listed, look for the person with the City Guide badge. Tours are held rain or shine. Meeting places change with each tour.

FRIDAY TOURS -- "Cityscapes and Public Places:" 10 a.m. and 1:30 p.m. Discover hidden gardens, rooftop parks and other surprises plus a bonus of spectacular views. This tour has many stairs. Meet at the Native Sons Monument, Montgomery and Market streets.

"Fisherman's Wharf:'' 11 a.m. See a side of Fisherman's Wharf most never see. Learn about swimmers who survived (or didn't) the treacherous Bay, the baseball great whose dad wanted him to be a fisherman, how Ghirardelli got here from Peru, what is underneath Aquatic Park, and more. Meet at benches in park at foot of Larkin St.

"Fire Department Museum:" 1 p.m. See antique engines and artifacts and learn about the history of firefighting in San Francisco. Meet at the San Francisco Fire Department Museum, Presidio Avenue between Bush and Pine streets.

"1906 -- Presidio and the Earthquake:" First & third Friday, 1 p.m. Walking through the Presidio, explore the role of the Army in this extraordinary time. Learn about the 200,000 San Franciscans left homeless by the earthquake and their struggles to return to a normal life. A 1906 Earthquake Centennial event. Meet at the Officers' Club and Visitor Center. "Gold Rush City:'' 1:30 p.m. Visit Portsmouth and Jackson Squares, the haunts of the original '49ers and relive San Francisco's early history. Learn about the Vigilance Committees, the fleet of abandoned ships, Emperor Norton and why "hoodlum'' is a San Francisco term. Meet at Clay and Montgomery streets, at the corner of the Transamerica Pyramid near the flower stand.

MONDAY TOURS -- "1906 -- Earthquake and Fire:" First and third Mondays, 10 a.m. Imagine awakening in the predawn hours to this massive April 18 earthquake and finding a place to survive. With the city water pipes ripped apart and fire raging at your heels, escape the alleyways south of Market Street to what should be the safety of Union Square. A 1906 Earthquake Centennial event. Meet at the benches between 525 and 555 Market streets.

"Bawdy and Naughty:" 11 a.m. This two block stroll takes a historic look at a "shady profession'' with a sympathetic view for the women who crossed the seas and prairies for a better life. Learn about Belle Cora, Ah Toy, French parlor houses and Barbary Coast dives -- all Gold Rush era entertainment. Meet at the eastern Maiden Lane Gate, off Kearny Street between Post and Geary streets.

"Chinatown:" 1:30 p.m. (and 10 a.m. on second and fourth Mondays). Explore colorful alleys and side streets containing family association offices, sewing shops, community service organizations and churches. See the area's post-fire buildings and browse in specialty shops. Meet at Portsmouth Square, corner of Kearny and Clay streets; Upper Level, near elevator.

"North Beach by Night:" 7 p.m. Food, culture, colorful history, and unexpected views all intersect in an erstwhile Italian "urban village" that was also cradle to San Francisco's bohemia. Meet in front of Specs Cafi, 12 Saroyan Place, just off Columbus, south of Broadway.

SATURDAY TOURS -- "Chinatown:" 10 a.m. Explore the colorful alleys and side streets which are the essence of Chinatown, home of family organizations, sewing shops, community organizations and churches. Meet in Portsmouth Square, upper level, at the end of the pedestrian bridge near the elevator.

"North Beach:" 10 a.m. Learn about the International District, home to Little Italy, Bohemians and Beatniks. Meet on the steps of Sts. Peter and Paul Church, 666 Filbert St. across from Washington Square.

"Sheraton Palace Hotel:" 10 a.m. Tour the elegantly restored 1909 Palace Hotel. A tour of the historic hotel includes its three ballrooms, the Maxfield and Pied Piper Bars, the Palace Court and the hotel meeting rooms. Tours last between an hour and an hour-and-a-half. Enter at 2 New Montgomery St. and met on the left side of the lobby.

"SOMA/Yerba Buena Center:" Second Saturday, 10 a.m. Tour the landscaped gardens and see the unique sculpture throughout. Meet in front of St. Patrick's Church, Mission Street between Third and Fourth streets.

"Pacific Heights Mansions:" 11 a.m. Walk past palatial homes and consulates in Pacific Heights. Learn of Victorian lifestyles and earthquake refugees. See mansions used as Japanese and German consulates in 1941. Meet at Alta Plaza Park, top of staircase, Pierce and Clay streets.

"Mission Murals:" First and third Saturdays, 11 a.m. See the colorful art of the Mission District, one of San Francisco's largest ethnic communities. Meet at Precita Avenue and Harrison Street, behind Flynn Elementary School. "Landmark Victorians of Alamo Square:'' First and third Saturday, 11 a.m. See some of San Francisco's most opulent and carefully restored "Painted Ladies,'' including the world famous Postcard Row. Includes breathtaking panoramic views from the Alamo Square Historic District. Meet in front of 824 Grove St.

"Inner Sunset:" Second Saturday, 11 a.m. Discover how this charming neighborhood emerged from the windswept dunes deemed hopeless by Frederick Law Olmstead, but coveted by developers and residents of San Francisco. See the neighborhood, view provocative murals and hear about the area's fascinating history and lore. Meet at Arguello Boulevard and Hugo Street.

"Ferry Building:" Noon. At one time, the Ferry Building was the heart of San Francisco and the second busiest terminal in the world. The building of the bridges took its toll on the ferries, misguided alterations ruined the interior of the building, and a freeway cut it off from the rest of the city. Now see the results of the multi-million dollar renovation and the building's new culinary epicenter. This is a 45-minute tour. Meet at the Main Entrance near the stairs.

"Fire Department Museum:" 1 p.m. See antique engines and artifacts and learn about the history of firefighting in San Francisco. Meet at the San Francisco Fire Department Museum, Presidio Avenue between Bush and Pine streets.

"Palace of Fine Arts/Marina:" Third Saturdays, 1 p.m. Hear about the 1915 Panama Pacific International Exposition. Learn about the design and history of the "palace,'' the most loved building at the fair. Walk through the restored Marina District and enjoy its Mediterranean and Art Deco styles and atmosphere. The tour ends with coffee/conversation on Art Deco/Modern Chestnut Street. Meet at the corner of Bay and Lyon streets.

"Telegraph Hill Hike:" 1 p.m. See cliff hangers and pre-1870 homes, plus views, gardens and more. All the unique elements of Telegraph Hill. The hike includes lots of stairs. Meet at the Marconi Monument across from 290 Lombard St. THERE IS NO PARKING IN THIS AREA SO PLAN TO TAKE PUBLIC TRANSPORTATION.

"1906 -- Phoenix Rising:" First Saturdays, 1 p.m. Find out how a mother cooked breakfast for her family and burned down a neighborhood, how City Hall was destroyed both literally and figuratively, and how the City rushed to rise from its ashes and rebuild better that ever. A 1906 Earthquake Centennial event. Meet at Memorial Court, the small park at Fulton and Franklin streets.

"1906 -- Presidio and The Earthquake:" Second, fourth and fifth Saturday, 1 p.m. Walking through the Presidio, explore the role of the Army in this extraordinary time. Learn about the 200,000 San Franciscans left homeless by the earthquake and their struggles to return to a normal life. A 1906 Earthquake Centennial event. Meet at the Officers' Club and Visitor Center. "Land's End: Sutro Highs and Lows:'' 2 p.m. Recapture the flavor of Mayor Sutro's gift to the public, the park and baths of the late 1800s. Experience dramatic, wind-swept vistas in sunshine or fog with somewhat strenuous walking. Meet at the lion statue at the park entrance, 48th and Pt. Lobos avenues.

"Japantown:" First and third Saturdays, 2 p.m. See historic Victorians, cottage row, a Julia Morgan YMCA, the city's oldest hotel and the creations of Urban Renewal. Meet at Japantown Peace Pagoda, Buchanan Mall at Post Street.

"Embarcadero North-Herb Caen Way:" Second Saturdays, 2 p.m. Tour the waterfront area where much of the city's most dramatic growth occurred. Famed columnist Herb Caen captured San Francisco's colorful history, from shipping to recreation, from shifting sand dunes to skyscrapers, and from vice to vista. Tour meets in front of the Ferry Building under the Clock Tower, Herb Caen Way at the foot of Market Street.

SUNDAY TOURS -- "Cow Hollow:" First and third Sundays, 10 a.m. This tour covers the history of the Hollow, which has grown from truck gardens and dairy farms. Learn about the architecture and the ambiance of this attractive San Francisco neighborhood. Meet at Holy Trinity Cathedral, Van Ness Avenue and Green Street.

"Theatre in San Francisco:" Third Sundays, 10 a.m. Explore current theaters and the history of actors and theaters past. Meet at Yerba Buena Gardens, Mission Street between Third and Fourth Streets, by the outdoor stage.

"Dogpatch and Potrero Point:" First Sundays, 11 a.m. Explore the interesting past of the neighborhood, from historic working class cottages to modern lofts. Meet at 18th and Tennessee Streets. "Haight Ashbury:'' 11 a.m. An exploration of the streets, sidewalks, parks and vistas of this historic area, which was a resort area in the 1890s. Somewhat strenuous. Meet at Park Branch Library, 1833 Page St.

"Golden Gate Bridge:" 11 a.m. Learn about one of the world's most famous bridges, how and by whom it was built and about the "Halfway to Hell Club.'' See the 1984 "bend in the bridge.'' Learn how the bridge cheated the "law'' of concrete and steel. Meet at the Strauss Statue near the San Francisco visitor parking area at the south end of the bridge.

"Art Deco Marina:" Second Sundays, 11 a.m. Admire the stylish and elegant buildings of the Marina while learning to recognize the Art Deco style made popular in the 1930s and '40s. View the shops on Chestnut Street in a new light. Meet in front of the Marina Library, 1890 Chestnut St.

"Rising Steel: Three Centuries of San Francisco Architecture:" Second and fourth Sundays, 11 a.m. Explore downtown architecture from as early as 1891 up to today. Learn about the architectural trends that literally changed the face of America, while seeing world famous buildings, little known treasures and public art. The tour covers 50 buildings in two hours. Meet at Stockton Street and Maiden Lane, just east of Union Square.

"Castro: Tales of the Village:" 11 a.m. A chance to explore a neighborhood that you only thought you knew. Walk through the Castro/Eureka Valley neighborhood that was once dairy Farms and dirt roads and now is one of the City's most vibrant and cohesive communities with popular and stylish shops, restaurants, and bars. Meet at Harvey Milk Plaza at Castro and Market Streets under the large rainbow flag.

"Downtown Deco:" Third Sundays, 11 a.m. Discover downtown's legacy of the Art Deco era. See a variety of the numerous permutations of American Deco/Moderne architecture. Meet in front of the old Pacific Bell Building (not the ball park formerly known as PacBell), 140 New Montgomery.

"Mission Dolores Neighborhood:" Noon. Come explore the streets, sidewalks, parks and vistas that tell the story of this 1890s resort area that was developed by comfortable merchants, whose gingerbread homes still grace its streets. Meet at the corner of 20th and Church streets.

"Murals in the Multi-Ethnic Mission:" Second and fourth Sundays, noon. See a four-story mural at the Women's Building and an eight-story example at Bethany Center. Also visit a multicultural neighborhood of 1880s Victorian homes. Meet at the Women's Building, 3543 18th St. between Guerrero and Valencia streets.

"Fire Department Museum:" 1 p.m. See antique engines and artifacts and learn about the history of firefighting in San Francisco. Meet at the San Francisco Fire Department Museum, Presidio between Bush and Pine streets.

"Nob Hill:" 2 p.m. See the great cathedral, the four prestigious hotels and the exclusive men's club that stands where the rococo palaces of the old railroad and silver kings once stood. Learn some of the history of the hill and see the fabulous views. Meet in front of the Stanford Court Hotel, California Street between Powell and Mason streets.

"Gold Rush City:" 2 p.m. Visit Portsmouth and Jackson squares, the haunts of the original '49ers and relive San Francisco's early history. Learn about the Vigilance Committees, the fleet of abandoned ships, Emperor Norton and why "hoodlum'' is a San Francisco term. Meet at Clay and Montgomery streets, at the corner of the Transamerica Pyramid near the flower stand.

"Victorian San Francisco:" 2 p.m. Walk around Lafayette Square and learn about the beauty of San Francisco Victorian architecture. See mansions of the early 20th century while visiting the city's first suburb, circa 1855. Some steep streets and many fabulous views. Meet at 1801 Bush Street at Octavia Street. "North Beach by Night:'' 7 p.m. Food, culture, colorful history, and unexpected views all intersect in an erstwhile Italian "urban village" that was also cradle to San Francisco's bohemia. Meet in front of Specs Cafi, 12 Saroyan Place, just off Columbus, south of Broadway.

THURSDAY TOURS -- "Civic Center-City Hall:" 11 a.m. See the grand buildings that replaced the ruins of the 1906 earthquake and learn what is new in the Civic Center, including the glorious interior of City Hall, refurbished following the 1998 Loma Prieta Earthquake. Meet next to the Main Library at the Pioneer Monument on Fulton Street between Hyde and Larkin streets.

"Fire Department Museum:" 1 p.m. See antique engines and artifacts and learn about the history of firefighting in San Francisco. Meet at the San Francisco Fire Department Museum, Presidio Avenue between Bush and Pine streets.

"Sheraton Palace Hotel:" 2 p.m. Tour the elegantly restored 1909 Palace Hotel. A tour of the historic hotel includes its three ballrooms, the Maxfield and Pied Piper Bars, the Palace Court and the hotel meeting rooms. Tours last between an hour and an hour-and-a-half. Enter at 2 New Montgomery St. and meet on the left side of the lobby.

"Embarcadero South:" Third Thursdays, 11 a.m. Discover the changing faces of this once-bustling port and exclusive area. Meet at Mission and Steuart Streets, by Rincon Center.

TUESDAY TOURS -- "Sheraton Palace Hotel:" 10 a.m. Tour the elegantly restored 1909 Palace Hotel. A tour of the historic hotel includes its three ballrooms, the Maxfield and Pied Piper Bars, the Palace Court and the hotel meeting rooms. Tours last between an hour and an hour-and-a-half. Enter at 2 New Montgomery St.

"North Beach:" Fourth Tuesdays, 10 a.m. Learn about the International District, home to Little Italy, Bohemians and Beatniks. Meet on the steps of Sts. Peter and Paul Church, 666 Filbert St. across from Washington Square.

"Pacific Heights Mansions:" Third Tuesdays, 11 a.m. Walk past palatial homes and consulates in Pacific Heights. Learn of Victorian lifestyles and earthquake refugees. See mansions used as Japanese and German consulates in 1941. Meet at Alta Plaza, top of staircase above Pierce and Clay streets.

"The Ferry Building:" Noon. Learn the long history of San Francisco's Ferry Building and about its multi-million dollar renovation. See the new culinary epicenter. Meet at the main entrance near the stairs to the second floor, Ferry Building, Embarcadero at Market Street.

"Historic Market Street: Path of Gold:" 1:30 p.m. Learn about the mystery, intrigue and controversy along the Path of Gold from the foot of Market Street to Lotta's Fountain. Along the way see buildings that survived the earthquake and fire of 1906. Meet at One Market Plaza, Market Street between Steuart and Spear streets.

WEDNESDAY TOURS -- "Theater in San Francisco:" Second and third Wednesdays, 10 a.m. Discover 150 years of theater as it evolved in San Francisco from 1849 to the present. Learn about current theaters and those that fell in 1906, prominent actors, and trends that occurred over the years. Meet at Yerba Buena Gardens, Mission between 3rd and 4th streets by the outdoor stage on the southeast corner of the park.

"Landmark Victorians of Alamo Square:" First and third Wednesdays, 11 a.m. See some of San Francisco's most opulent and carefully restored "Painted Ladies,'' including the world famous Postcard Row. Includes breathtaking panoramic views from the Alamo Square Historic District. Meet in front of 824 Grove St.

"Gold Rush City:" 11 a.m. Visit Portsmouth and Jackson Squares, the haunts of the original '49ers, and relive San Francisco's early history. Learn about the Vigilance Committee, the fleet of abandoned ships, Emperor Norton and why "hoodlum'' is a San Francisco term. Meet at Clay and Montgomery streets, at the corner of the Transamerica Pyramid near the flower stand.

"1906 -- Phoenix Rising:" First Wednesdays, noon. Find out how a mother cooked breakfast for her family and burned down a neighborhood, how City Hall was destroyed both literally and figuratively, and how the City rushed to rise from its ashes and rebuild better that ever. A 1906 Earthquake Centennial event. Meet at Memorial Court, the small park at Fulton and Franklin streets.

"Nob Hill:" 2 p.m. Learn about the area where railroad barons and silver kings once had mansions. Meet at the Stanford Court Hotel, on California Street between Powell and Mason.

Free. Times change with each tour. San Francisco Public Library, 100 Larkin St., San Francisco. (415) 557-4266, www.sfcityguides.org.

CRUISIN' THE CASTRO --

"Historical Tour," Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday, 10 a.m.-12 noon. Explore the social and political history of San Francisco's Castro district, which many consider to be a home to gay, lesbian, bi-sexual and transgender culture. The tours visit places such as the Castro Theatre, Twin Peaks Tavern, Pink Triangle Memorial Park, and the former shop and residence of the late San Francisco Supervisor Harvey Milk. Tours meet at the Rainbow Flag pole at the corner of Castro and Market streets, above Harvey Milk Plaza. Reservations are required. $25-$35, free for children under five.

"Harvey Milk Tour," Wednesday, 10 a.m.-12:30 p.m. The tour honors the late Harvey Milk, who became the first openly gay politician in the state of California when he was elected to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors in 1977. Sites visited along the tour include Harvey Milk Plaza, the Civil Rights Academy, and City Hall, where Milk worked and was ultimately assasinated on November 27, 1978. Tour meets at the Rainbow Flag pole at the corner of Castro and Market streets, above Harvey Milk Plaza. Reservations are required. $35-$45, free for children under five.

EMBARCADERO CENTER SELF-GUIDED WALKING TOUR -- The multi-building complex making up the Embarcadero Center is rich with public art. Pick up a self-guided tour program at one of the kiosks or security desks in the complex and see artwork by international artists. The tour begins at Le Meridien San Francisco on Battery Street and continues through the Embarcadero Center buildings, Justin Herman Plaza, the Hyatt Regency San Francisco, and ends on the Street Level of Four Embarcadero Center.

FIESTA TOURS -- Call for schedule information. "The Summer of Love Continues..'' Take a two-hour walking tour of San Francisco's Haight Ashbury district and see the site of the Straight Theatre where Janis Joplin and Jimi Hendrix performed; the Haight-Ashbury Free Medical Clinic, the house where the Grateful Dead lived, coffeehouses, boutiques and psychedelic smoke shops and murals portraying the area during the "Summer of Love.'' Tour includes a stop at a local cafe, a chance to do some shopping along the way, and a stop at the Historic Red Victorian Bed and Breakfast Hotel. Tours are led by a former Hippie who brings you up to date on today's Haight. Advance Reservations required. Meeting place and time will be given with confirmation of reservation.

$15 per person. Given with confirmation of reservation. San Francisco. (415) 775-6773.

FOREIGN LANGUAGE DOCENT TOURS AT THE FINE ARTS MUSEUMS OF SAN FRANCISCO -- Visitors will find major European works by Old Masters, including medieval sculpture, religious art and tapestries and 17th-century Dutch, English and French paintings as well as a great American art collection, antique furniture, and a superb textile collection. Tours are in Spanish, French, Russian, and Italian with special request tours available in Cantonese and German for groups of 10 or more. Docent-guided tours are available in several languages. Call to make arrangements for tours in a variety of languages including French, Italian, Spanish, and Russian.

Tours are available at The Legion of Honor Museum, Lincoln Park, 34th Avenue and Clement Street, San Francisco, and at The de Young Museum, Golden Gate Park, 50 Hagiwara Tea Garden Drive, San Francisco.

Free with regular admission of $6-$10; free children under age 12; free to all on the first Tuesday of the month. (415) 750-3638, www.thinker.org.

FORTUNE COOKIE BAKERY TOUR -- See how fortune cookies, invented in San Francisco, are made and how the tiny fortune messages are inserted. Call to set up an appointment for a tour.

GOLDEN GATE MODEL RAILROADERS INC. -- The club's HO-scale layout shows in miniature the engineering and geographical features of California railroads, past and present. Various types of bridges span canyons and dry washes. In addition there is a narrowgauge railroad line that winds through the mountains. The layout is in a room measuring 57 feet long and 38 feet wide. The mainline is about 600 feet long, nearly 10 scale miles, with an additional 200 feet or so of sidings and passing tracks. The members run the trains informally for fun on Saturdays.

"Historical Walking Tours of Golden Gate Park." Trained volunteer guides describe how sand dunes on the "outside lands'' of San Francisco were developed into this beloved woodland park. There are several different tours:

"Japanese Tea Garden." On this 45-minute tour, see the oldest public Japanese garden in the United States and the most popular exhibit of the 1894 Midwinter International Exhibition. Meet inside the main gate after admission of $3.50 general and $1.25 seniors and children is paid. Yearround: Sunday and Wednesday, 1 p.m. (415) 752-1171 or (415) 752-4227.

"Stroller Walks," First and third Wednesdays of the month. These walks are designed for parents pushing strollers. Enjoy fresh air, meet other parents, and learn a little history about the park. The walks begin at 10 a.m. and last approximately one hour.

"Whale Watching Trips," 8 a.m.; Saturdays and Sundays through October 31, 2010. Join FMSA and San Francisco Whale Tours on a day-long whale watching trip in the Gulf of the Farallones National Marine Sanctuary. Humpback whales, the occasional blue whale, as well as porpoises, sea lions, or any of many other species of marine mammals found in Sanctuary waters may be encountered. Departs from Pier 39 in San Francisco. Call or check website for reservations. Trip last six hours. $74.45.

HAAS-LILIENTHAL HOUSE -- This historic Queen Anne is distinguished as the only intact private home of the period that is open regularly as a museum, complete with authentic furniture and artifacts. The House has elaborate wooden gables, a circular corner tower and luxuriant ornamentation. Volunteer docents lead tours through the House and explain the Victorian architecture of the exterior. A display of photographs in the downstairs supper-room describes the history of the home and the family that lived here until 1972.

Tours are offered regularly on Sundays from 11 a.m.-4 p.m. and on Wednesdays and Saturdays from Noon-3 p.m. Special group tours are also available.

HAIGHT-ASHBURY FLOWER POWER WALKING TOUR -- A guided walking tour of San Francisco's 1960s hippie neighborhood that includes the area's earlier history as a Victorian neighborhood and weekend resort. The tour begins opposite the Stanyan Park Hotel, just beyond the McDonald's parking lot. Reservations are recommended.

HAUNTED HAIGHT WALKING TOUR -- An evening adventure through the Haight-Ashbury to learn about the macabre history of "The Haight.'' Hear real ghost stories and see where the famous and infamous lived. Not suitable for children under age 13. Wear warm clothing as the San Francisco evenings are notoriously cool to cold. Reservations required.

HELEN'S GRAND WALK TOUR -- Helen Rendon gives a personalized introduction to San Francisco. Beginning at Union Square, the downtown hub dominated by elegant department stores and richly appointed shops catering to every taste, the tour covers three famous areas of the city: Union Square, Chinatown and North Beach. Highlights include historic landmarks, art galleries and stories from the past. The tour lasts three hours. Reservations required.

HOBNOB TOURS OF SAN FRANCISCO -- Take a tour of Nob Hill, sometimes called Fern Hill or the Hill of Palaces. Learn about the railroad barons and Silver King who built palatial mansions on the top of the hill overlooking the Financial District. The tour includes the Flood Mansion, Huntington Park, the Wells Fargo Museum, the Merchant Exchange Building and the Fairmont Hotel. Buffet breakfast at the Terrace Room in the Ritz-Carlton Hotel, lunch at the Big Four Restaurant in the Huntington Hotel; or High Tea in the lobby of the Renaissance Stanford Court Hotel are offered for an additional charge. Walking shoes recommended. Reservations required. Look for the guide sporting a dazzling 10-carat diamond pin.

JAVAWALK -- This two-hour walk in the city center covers San Francisco's coffee roots (more significant than Seattle's) and coffeehouse culture (think beatnik). Along the way learn some of San Francisco's history and hear some arcane trivia and stories the Java girl has collected from many years of living in the city. Java walk also makes a couple of stops at North Beach cafes for a quick java jolt. Reservations required. Directions will be given when tickets are purchased online.

LOCAL TASTES OF THE CITY TOURS -- Follow local tour guides through a neighborhood of your choice, sampling some of the finest food that San Francisco has to offer, and meeting the local artisans that prepare the culinary delights. Pick from Chinatown, North Beach, or night tours.

MISSION DOLORES -- Closed Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year's Day. Take a selfguided tour of the historic mission. Originally titled Mission San Francisco de Assisi, Mission Dolores is one of a chain of missions in California begun by Father Junipero Serra in 1776. The mission chain, a day's walk apart, stretches from San Diego to San Rafael. Mission Dolores was built in 1776.

Experience the adventure of touring around the world's most popular city in a vintage 11-passenger vehicle. The tour features custom built, pre-1930's cars that offer unparalleled views of the beauty and history of San Francisco.

Tours of the Grove, An informal guided tour of the grove covers approximately 7.5 acres in the eastern end of San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. The Grove, an area dedicated to those affected by HIV/AIDS, changes with each season and even the daily play of light and shadow makes each visit a new experience. Tours begin and end at the Main Portal and are approximately 20 minutes long. Call to schedule an individual or group tour.

Free. March through October: Third Saturday of the month, 9 a.m.-noon. Golden Gate Park, near the corner of Middle East and Bowling drives, San Francisco. (415) 750-8340, www.aidsmemorial.org.

NATIONAL MARITIME MUSEUM LIBRARY (THE J. PORTER SHAW MARITIME LIBRARY) -- Closed on federal holidays. The library, part of the San Francisco Maritime National Historic Park, focuses on sail and steam ships on the West Coast and the Pacific Basin from 1520 to the present. The museum library holdings include a premiere collection of maritime history: books, magazines, oral histories, ships' plans and the San Francisco Maritime National Historical Park's 250,000 photographs.

Free. By appointment only, Monday-Friday, 1-4 p.m., and the third Saturday of each month. Fort Mason Center, Building E, Third Floor, Buchanan Street and Marina Boulevard, San Francisco. (415) 560-7080, (415) 560-7030, www.nps.gov/safr/local/lib/libtop.html.

PIER 39 -- A pier filled with shops, restaurants, theaters and entertainment of all sorts from sea lions to street performers.

PRECITA EYES MURAL ARTS AND VISITORS CENTER -- "The Mission Trail: A Self-Guided Walking Tour." The tour, designed to make people more familiar with the Mission District, begins at Valencia and 24th streets and features historical locations, local businesses, cultural and community organizations and murals. Included are Galeria de la Raza, St. Francis Fountain and Candy Store, St. Peter's Church, Brava!, Women in the Arts Theatre, the Mission Cultural Center for Latino Arts and the Balmy Alley murals. A chain of footprints indicates the Trail and Aztec calendar day symbols mark each important location. Pick up a map at the Center. Free."

Mission Trail Mural Walks,'' Saturday and Sunday, 1;30 p.m. See the famous murals of San Francisco's Historic Mission District in the company of a professional muralist. Participants view 75 murals over a six-block area preceded by a brief slide show on the history and process of mural art. The tour is approximately two hours long. No reservations needed. Meet at the Precita Eyes Mural Arts and Visitors Center, 2981 24th St. $2-$12.

Mission District Mural Walks, Saturday, 11 a.m. A public mural walk with an introductory slide/talk by a muralist from Precita Eyes Mural Arts Center. Some of the murals included are those in Balmy Alley, 24th Street minipark, Flynn School (Precita Avenue and Harrison Street), China Books (24th and Harrison streets), Garfield Pool (25th and Harrison streets) and Cesar Chavez School (Shotwell and 23rd streets). Meet at Cafi Venice, 3325 24th St., near the 24th and Mission streets BART Station. $2-$10.

Murals of Precita Park, Sunday, 11 a.m. See 50 murals in an eight-block walk. See where community mural art started at the historic studio and neighborhood of Precita Eyes Muralists and learn about the monumental murals of Precita Park. Tour includes murals at Balmy Alley, Flynn School (Precita Avenue and Harrison Street), The Precita Valley Community Center, and Garfield Park (25th and Harrison streets). Tours leave from the Precita Eyes Mural Arts and Visitors Center, 2981 24th St. $2-$10.

RENDEZVOUS CHARTERS -- A nautical adventure aboard the Brigantine "Rendezvous'' or the "Bay Lady'' for brunch, a sunset cruise or a Sunday afternoon cruise. Plan to wear tennis or deck shoes, dress warmly and arrive 30 minutes before scheduled departure time. Reservations required. Cruises depend on the weather during the winter so call ahead for trip confirmation the day of the sail to see if weather permits the trip.

Pier 40, South Beach Harbor, south of the Bay Bridge, Embarcadero at Townsend Street, San Francisco. (415) 543-7333, www.rendezvouscharters. com.

SAN FRANCISCO ARCHITECTURAL HERITAGE -- NO TOURS ON HOLIDAYS.

"Pacific Heights Walking Tour," A two-hour, guided walking tour of surviving Victorian and pre-World-War-I mansions, elaborate family homes and smaller row houses. The tour discusses the architecture that borrowed styles from Europe and the East Coast and used them in unique ways. Expect breathtaking views as well as stories of earthquakes, fortunes and fame. Begins at Haas-Lilienthal House. Reservations not required. Sunday, 12:30 p.m.

"Haas-Lilienthal House Tours," This Queen Anne historic house museum, with its original fittings and furnishings, stands as a monument to life in San Francisco in the late 19th century. The house tour takes approximately one hour. Call to confirm tours are being given. Wednesday and Saturday, noon to 3 p.m.; Sunday, 11 a.m. to 4 p.m.

SAN FRANCISCO SATURDAY WALKING TOURS -- Four walking tours are being offered. Each tour covers 15 to 20 blocks and takes about two hours. The tours are given on a rotating basis every Saturday at 1:30 p.m. All tours except the one on the first Saturday begin at the Haas-Lilienthal House. Wear layered clothing and comfortable walking shoes. Water will be provided. Reservations suggested. (415) 441-3000 X11.

"City Beautiful to City Center," This walk is the flattest of the four and is a comprehensive exploration of the Civic Center Historic District including the area's Beaux Arts architecture and public art. First Saturday of the month. Meeting place will be given with reservations. NOTE: THIS TOUR DOES NOT START AT THE HAAS-LILIENTHAL HOUSE.

"A Walk Along Broadway," This walk explores the area north and west of the Haas-Lilienthal House. Included are a number of Victorian houses along Broadway including the one used for the film "Mrs. Doubtfire,'' numerous Classical Revival buildings, and two former mansions of Silver King James Flood. The second Saturday of the month.

"Beyond Union Street: A Walk Through Cow Hollow," Learn about the early years of Cow Hollow through the distinctive architecture of the neighborhood, including early dairy farms, roadway inns, converted stables and barns, Victorian houses and mansions, and the grand art deco apartment buildings that replaced them. This tour's time period ranges from the 1850s to the 1920s. The third Saturday of the month.

"Walk the Fire Line: Van Ness Avenue," On this walk along Van Ness Avenue, learn about the earthquake and subsequent fire and the effect these disasters had on this street which changed from being a grand residential boulevard to a high style commercial row created to showcase the latest in modern conveniences, the automobile. See some post-1906 architecture as well as a few pre-quake survivors. The fourth Saturday of the month.

SAN FRANCISCO CABLE CAR MUSEUM -- The museum is located in the historic Cable Car Barn and Powerhouse. Visitors can see the actual cable winding machinery, grips, track, cable and brakes, as well as three historic cable cars, photo displays and mechanical artifacts. The best way to get to this museum is by cable car; street parking is practically non-existent.

SAN FRANCISCO CITY HALL DOCENT TOURS -- Docent-led tours of the refurbished City Hall. Highlights of all tours consist of descriptions of the building's history, architectural elements and recent seismic upgrading as well as visits to the Mayor's Office and the Board of Supervisors Chamber. Some docent tours include the art exhibitions and permanent collection of art by contemporary local artists on display. All tours run 45 minutes to an hour.

Free. Monday-Friday, 10 a.m., noon and 2 p.m. Meet at the City Hall Docent Tour Kiosk on the main floor on the Van Ness Avenue side of City Hall by the elevators, Van Ness Avenue between Grove and McAllister Streets, San Francisco. (415) 554-6139, www.sfgov.org.

SAN FRANCISCO COLUMBARIUM TOURS -- The public can visit this beautiful landmark building that has been renovated by the Neptune Society of Northern California. Storyteller Emmitt Watson leads tours of this 100-year-old neo-classic building, the home of urns of some of San Francisco's famous pioneering families. Reservations required.

SAN FRANCISCO FEDERAL RESERVE BANK -- The San Francisco Fed offers one of the world's foremost collections of historic United States currency, as well as a look at cash and check processing.

The Fed Center: Exploring our Nation's Central Bank, a permanent installation at the San Francisco Fed, is designed to teach the public about the functions of the U.S. central bank through a series of guided hands-on and visually engaging experiences. Whimsical and thought-provoking elements in the exhibit include giant iconic representations of financial concepts, such as a free-floating sphere, a suspended safe, and a 14-foot tilting chair. Also featured is a newly designed Currency Collection. Schedule a group tour now or drop in any Friday at noon.

Prearranged tours are available to groups of students (high school and college), teachers, bankers, and community and business organizations, with a minimum of 8 persons (10 persons for San Francisco only) and a maximum of 30. Sixty-minute public tours of the Fed Center exhibit are available on a walk-in basis Fridays at noon. A minimum of two weeks advance notice as well as a list of tour participants submitted to the tour coordinators two weeks prior to the scheduled visit is required.

Free. Group tours by appointment only, Monday-Thursday at 9:30 a.m. & 1:30 p.m.; Sixty-minute public tours available on Fridays at noon, on a drop-in basis. 101 Market St., San Francisco. (415) 974-3252, www.frbsf.org/federalreserve/tours.html.

SAN FRANCISCO FIRE ENGINE TOURS AND ADVENTURES -- "Golden Gate/Presidio/Sausalito Tour." Take a unique tour in the back of a bright-red 1955 Mack fire engine. The tour goes through the Presidio, to Fort Point, over the Golden Gate Bridge, into Sausalito and to a photo stop at Fort Baker; then back across the bridge, through the Union Street neighborhood and ends at The Cannery. Reservations strongly recommended.

SAN FRANCISCO GHOST HUNT -- Walk to some of San Francisco's most notorious haunted places and meet the enchanting ghosts that call them home. Hear ghost stories based on serious documented research, see and touch eerie haunted artifacts, and learn how to catch a ghost. Along the way, learn the wild and romantic history of San Francisco's beautiful Pacific Heights district where these ghosts haunt today. Dress warmly as San Francisco nights are cold even in the summer. The tour is primarily outdoors and includes an hour inside one haunted building. The walk is easy with an easy pace but there is one moderate hill. Not recommended for children under age 8 because of the length of the tour and late evening ending. Reservations are not required, but do call to confirm tour. The walk is about a mile long and takes place rain or shine.

SAN FRANCISCO MOVIE TOURS -- From the inception of film to present day big-screen productions, the San Francisco Bay Area has always been a magnet for scouts seeking dramatic movie locations. The unmatched beauty of San Francisco combined with its riches of instantly recognizable structures and locales has attracted filmmakers from around the world. San Francisco Movie Tours offers the opportunity to visit these life-sized movie sets. Discover the unique sensation that is sweeping San Francisco. Watch real movie clips aboard a luxury "theater on wheels'' -- designed to provide the ultimate movie tour experience -- while passing by the actual location. Learn behind-the-scenes information and trivia about films, directors, and actors.

The tour starts and finishes in Fisherman's Wharf at Pier 43 =. Pick-up and drop-off provided at various main tourists locales (contact for details). Tour is 3 hours long. There will be 2 stops along the way for rest and photography.